Scientists are debating the fatality rate of COVID.Some say it’s less risky than the flu

Has COVID-19 become less dangerous than the flu for most people?

That’s the question scientists are debating as the country heads into its third pandemic winter. In the early days of the pandemic, COVID was estimated to be 10 times more lethal than the flu, fueling the fears of many.

“We’ve all been asking, ‘When will COVID look like the flu?'” said Dr. Monica Gandhi, an infectious disease specialist at the University of California, San Francisco. “And they’ll say, ‘Yes, we’re there.'”

Gandhi and other researchers argue that most people today have sufficient immunity from vaccination, infection, or both to protect them from becoming seriously ill from COVID. doing.And this is especially true since the omicron variant Doesn’t seem to make people sick as much as previous strainssays Gandhi.

So unless a more virulent variant emerges, the threat of COVID to most people would be considerably reduced. in short, Gandhi wants them to be able to go about their daily lives “as if they had the endemic seasonal flu.”

However, there are still many different points of view on this topic. The threat of COVID-19 may come close to the danger posed by the flu, but skeptics don’t think we’re there yet.

“I’m sorry, but I do not agree,” said Dr. Anthony Fauci White House Medical Advisor, Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. “The severity of one is very grim compared to the other, and the chances of one killing the other are grim.”

COVID is still killing hundreds of people every day. This means that if deaths continue at this pace, he could see more than 125,000 additional deaths from his COVID in the next 12 months. COVID-19 has already killed over a million Americans and that 3rd leading cause of death 2021 years.

bad flu season kill about 50,000 people.

“COVID is a much more serious public health problem than the flu,” said Fauci, and this is especially true for the elderly, who are the group most at risk of dying from the disease.

Debate about counting deaths

The debate over COVID mortality hinges on what is considered a death from COVID-19.Gandhi and other researchers claim daily death toll is due to COVID exaggerated This is because many of the deaths attributed to the disease are actually due to other causes. Some of those who died for other reasons just happened to test positive for coronavirus.

“Today, we are consistently seeing more than 70% of COVID hospitalizations fall into that category,” said Dr. Shira DoronHe is an infectious disease specialist at Tufts Medical Center and a professor at Tufts University School of Medicine. “If you count them all as hospitalizations, and then those people die, and then count them all as deaths from COVID, you’re overestimating pretty dramatically.”

Delon says that if deaths were classified more accurately, the number of daily deaths would approach the number of casualties suffered by influenza during a typical season. The odds of dying (the so-called lethality rate) are estimated to be about 0.1% or less, similar to the current flu.

and New report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Researchers announced Thursday sought to exclude other deaths in analyzing mortality rates among people hospitalized “predominantly for COVID-19.” They found that mortality was significantly reduced in the Omicron era compared to the Delta era.

But Fauci argues that it’s hard to distinguish between deaths “caused by” COVID and deaths “due to” COVID. I know

“What’s the difference between someone who has mild congestive heart failure, is hospitalized, catches COVID, and dies of severe congestive heart failure?” he asks. “Is it due to COVID, or is it because of COVID? COVID has certainly contributed to that.”

Many experts believe COVID mortality is likely appear Due to home testing, many infections are currently not reported.

The fatality rate is the ratio of deaths to confirmed cases, so the more actual cases, the less likely an individual will die.

“I believe we’ve reached a point where, for individuals, COVID poses less risk of hospitalization and death than the flu,” says Delon.

Doctor Ashish JahHe is the White House COVID-19 Response Coordinator.

“If you are now up to date with vaccines and have access to treatments, your chances of dying from COVID are very, very low and definitely much lower than the risk of contracting the flu,” Jha said. told NPR.

Elderly and frail people still at high risk

But Jha said Omicron is so contagious and infects so many people that, on a population level, it poses a far greater threat to the American population than influenza. stress, and still have the potential to increase the total death toll.

Also, mortality from any disease varies with age and other demographic factors. Importantly, COVID is still far more deadly for the elderly and medically frail than the young.Recently Data from CDC People aged 65-74 are 60 times more likely to die than those aged 18-29. A person aged 75 to her 84 is at 140 times the risk. At age 85 and older he is 330 times at risk.

The risk is particularly high for those who have not been vaccinated, boosted, or treated appropriately. And with COVID still so widespread, they remain vulnerable to exposure from social contact.

Young and healthy people can get seriously ill and even die from COVID, It has become rare.

“I think it’s really important for people to have an accurate grasp of reality in order to navigate their lives,” he says. Jake Scott, an infectious disease specialist at Stanford University. “If their risk assessment is driven or influenced by these overestimated hospitalization and mortality rates, I think that’s a problem.”

Waiting for pattern confirmation

Other researchers claim COVID is still there much more dangerous from influenza.

“In no way has COVID-19 been milder than the flu,” said Dr. Ziyad al Ali PhD at Washington University in St. Louis, conducting research comparing COVID to influenza.

“In the history of pandemics, no study from the beginning to the present has found that COVID-19 poses an equal risk to the flu,” says Al-Aly. carries a higher risk.”

Some experts are awaiting further data that show a clear trend toward lower mortality rates.

“If you actually see a pattern similar to that, it’s safer to say, ‘Oh, COVID is like the flu,'” said Dr. Jeremy Faust, an emergency physician in the Department of Health Policy and Public Health at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. “We’re just starting to see it, we haven’t seen it in a sustained way.”

Many also point out that COVID may increase the risk of experiencing long-term health problems such as long-term COVID.

“Even people with mild to moderate symptoms from COVID can take COVID longer,” Fauci says. “That doesn’t happen with the flu. It’s a whole different ball game.”

But Gandhi questions that too. Much of her estimated risk of COVID over the long term, she says, comes from people who became seriously ill at the start of the pandemic.When if you explain itshe says the risk of long-term health problems may not be greater from COVID than from other viral infections such as the flu.

“It was really severe COVID-19 that led to prolonged COVID-19, and as the disease became milder, the proportion of prolonged COVID-19 decreased,” says Gandhi. .

In fact, some experts are even concerned that this year’s flu season could be worse than this winter’s COVID surge. After a season of very mild or no flu during the pandemic, this year’s flu has hit Australia hard. And what happens in the Southern Hemisphere often predicts what happens in North America.

“If we have a serious flu season and the Omicron variant continues to cause predominantly mild disease, this winter could be a much worse flu season than COVID. William Schaffneran infectious disease researcher at Vanderbilt University.

Copyright 2022 NPR. For more information, please visit the following URL: https://www.npr.org.