
Reclassification of earlier U.S. coronavirus deaths causes record 24-hour number - jdkee
https://www.wsj.com/articles/coronavirus-surges-in-some-asian-countries-that-had-been-lightly-hit-11587031743
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dorkwood
I think this is because NY is now reporting probable deaths, and not just
those who tested positive before dying.

~~~
cylinder
Dr Birx said the whole country is doing this, and she seems totally fine with
it.

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beezle
This was brought up during the daily Cuomo yesterday. The media have not fully
explained the new reporting (am I cynical if I say so they get better clicks?)

CDC mandated that all localities, not just NYC/NYS, count probable deaths in
addition to those where a covid positive test was available. These figures are
_not_ part of the 'official' covid death totals but instead are a separate
category.

The reason this has been done is likely due to the reports coming from NYFD/PD
concerning the much higher incidence of finding dead people when called. Those
bodies are not being brought to hospitals for autopsie or anything else if
there are no suspicious circumstances. By one report I read a few days back, a
year ago it was typical to have encounter 25 dead on 911 calls over a 24 hour
period. They are now seeing upwards of 200.

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maxroham1977
That's a wrong number for daily deaths. It factors in previous deaths counts
that weren't counted (mainly in NY). Those numbers should have been backdated.
Currently it seems like the daily death toll is rising, although it doesn't
(at least not so sharply).

~~~
aaron695
This is not what the media is reporting, they say it's in a 24 hour time
period.

Do you have a link?

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chkaloon
Didn't NY just add 3+ thousand that weren't counted before?

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Scipio_Afri
2 days ago.

"New York City raised its likely death toll from coronavirus by 3,778 people
on Tuesday afternoon"

[https://www.wsj.com/articles/nursing-homes-remain-a-
concern-...](https://www.wsj.com/articles/nursing-homes-remain-a-concern-as-
new-yorks-coronavirus-outbreak-appears-to-plateau-11586892250)

~~~
chkaloon
maybe there was a slight delay getting them in this count

~~~
jMyles
It's not (or at least, not only) a delay, but a change in methodology of
classification. Previously, all patients who tested positive for SARS-CoV-2
were counted, regardless of their cause of death. In the new methodology (in
order to ensure that false negatives aren't missed), people with a pattern of
symptoms are also counted, regardless of their cause of death.

So, many, many more people are counted than those who died directly from
complications arising from Covid-19.

This is not altogether unreasonable; we want to know how many people are dying
after contracting the virus. However, it is being reported as though the virus
is the cause of death, when nobody doing the reporting is claiming that it is.
It's a total mess.

Here's the actual data sheet:
[https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/doh/downloads/pdf/imm/covid-19-d...](https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/doh/downloads/pdf/imm/covid-19-daily-
data-summary-deaths-04162020-1.pdf)

~~~
yellow_postit
Unfortunately I’ve seen these methodological updates getting twisted to serve
various political ends - such as trying to discount the severity of the
pandemic because “clearly they are overcounting”

~~~
jMyles
If the number of deaths is overcounted (it might be, or it might be
undercounted, or it might be overcounted in some places and undercounted in
others), and the total number of cases is undercounted (it is; it's just a
matter of how far we keep adjusting - we can't gain confidence until we have
representative serological surveys), then the fatality rate (and thus almost
certainly the mortality rate) is also overestimated.

I don't know if that is "discounting the severity", but so far we've watched
the CFR go from the announcement at the WHO of 3.4% to paper after paper
finding below 1% (sometimes far below). I don't think that these researchers
are discounting the severity, I think they're doing the best they can with
limited data.

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asabjorn
It is worthwhile to notice that there are as of April 13 there are 11k
_weekly_ coronavirus related deaths according to the CDC out of 600k tested
[1].

In a normal flu season there are 8k _daily_ flu deaths [2].

The ones that are the worst affected should be in the hospital. The cumulative
rate of hospitalization is 12.3 per 100k, which adds up to 39k. So that puts
an upper bound on known risk. [3]

[1]
[https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/COVID19/index.htm](https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/COVID19/index.htm)

[2]
[https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/68/wr/mm6826a5.htm](https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/68/wr/mm6826a5.htm)

[3]
[https://gis.cdc.gov/grasp/COVIDNet/COVID19_3.html?fbclid=IwA...](https://gis.cdc.gov/grasp/COVIDNet/COVID19_3.html?fbclid=IwAR02UGPEV4r5LicjyNum1mpmFixTpCPYHJY8Nf3d8QV1iKrKK6ZlGTecifs)

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jb775
These numbers need to be seriously scrutinized for everyone's sake. Hospitals
are now financially incentivized to claim as many Coronavirus
hospitalizations/deaths as possible so they get their piece of the stimulus
package.

~~~
NotSammyHagar
That sounds like a conspiratoral worry. Hospitals are all lying? We should
just publish overall death rates long with traditional death rates and known
cv cases. it's guaranteed there are missed cv tests. In Seattle they have not
had enough cv tests to 'bother' testing the sad cases of large numbers of
people dying, even in the famous kirkland senior citizen homes.

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neonate
[https://archive.md/tD5QU](https://archive.md/tD5QU)

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Aeolun
Wow, that’s a doubling of deaths over 24 hours too. But I hope this is
exceptional. I cannot see this being 8000 deaths tomorrow.

~~~
surge
Hopefully, this is the peak we expected, meaning it won't keep going up by
very much.

~~~
vkou
The first peak, that is. It's likely that during the many re-openings to come,
we will have other peaks.

~~~
mlyle
I believe that if we loosen things a little soon, this will be the main one. I
think it is likely that we have reduced susceptibility by 15% in New York
already. And seasonal factors are swinging to be on our side.

If R0 was 2.5, a virus with Rt of 1.9 (*0.85, and then a little seasonal
benefit) is still scary, but it's a completely different ball game.

On the other hand, if we don't experiment with reopening a little soon, we'll
lose the chance to effectively use the time where weather is on our side...

Emphasis on "a little". Slightly increase the set of permitted activities,
designate an industry or two more as permitted, and continue to encourage mask
wearing.

~~~
jhwang5
Not sure why pessimistic views are downvoted. You are just expressing your
opinion and providing a reasonable reasoning.

~~~
mlyle
I'm not sure whether I was downvoted for being pessimistic or optimistic. Most
places seem headed towards extended controls and demanding a very high
standard for any reopening.

I'm in the SF Bay Area which has had a fairly steady daily case count in the
face of increased testing, but a declining number of COVID cases in ICU over
the past 10 days. The latter is a lagging indicator, so whatever trend is
there is going to continue for 10+ more days. IMO, we should slightly loosen
controls, but I do not think public health will even consider that before a
couple weeks have expired.

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vanniv
This is a garbage number.

New York reclassified a bunch of folks that died over the last few days as
COVID deaths under their new methodology, where all deaths are covid deaths if
there is even a hint that they might have had COVID.

These are not deaths that occurred in a 24-hour period. These are deaths that
were _reported_ in a 24-hour period, and covers basically everyone with any
respiratory illness who died at home on Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday.

Trying to compare that to a rate of deaths in hospital of likely or confirmed
cases (the methodology used from last week until Tuesday), or hospital deaths
of confirmed cases (the methodology used before last week) is meaningless.

If you change methodology, you really have to go back and recast historic
numbers. But that isn't being done.

~~~
henriquez
> If you change methodology, you really have to go back and recast historic
> numbers. But that isn't being done.

This makes sense~ without some kind of reporting standard, every jurisdiction
is free to apply their own methodology and we're prone to receive inaccurate
(or politically biased) information. That might mean inflating numbers, or
deflating (as is the case with China, an enormous country with miraculously no
infections or deaths since the day they coincidentally kicked all western
journalists out).

New York changing their methodology out of the blue this week puts a curious
asterisk on both the numbers we're getting from them now and the numbers we
got from them previously. Why the sudden change?

~~~
bb2018
NY still has their old number of "confirmed deaths" which they were using
previously and continue to report as a separate number from "probable deaths".

The article linked to doesn't mention that but what NY is doing makes sense.
It lets us see the general trends using the old methodology while still being
smart about counting going forward.

It is very open and every state + country should do something similar.

[https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/14/nyregion/new-york-
coronav...](https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/14/nyregion/new-york-coronavirus-
deaths.html?auth=login-email&login=email)

