Coronavirus might be less deadly than the panic suggests

Coronavirus going to hit its peak and start falling sooner than you think

Nations are closing borders, stocks are plummeting and a New York Times headline reads: “The Coronavirus Has Put the World’s Economy in Survival Mode.” Both political parties have realized the crisis could severely impact the November elections — House, Senate, presidency. And sacré bleu, they’ve even shuttered the Louvre! Some of these reactions are understand­able, much of it pure hysteria. Meanwhile, the spread of the virus continues to slow.

More than 18,000 Americans have died from this season’s generic flu so far, according to the latest data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. In 2018, the CDC estimated, there were 80,000 flu deaths. That’s against 19 coronavirus deaths so far, from about 470 cases. Worldwide, there have been about 3,400 coronavirus deaths, out of about 100,000 identified cases. Flu, by comparison, grimly reaps about 291,000 to 646,000 annually.

So that requires us to take a step back and use a little perspective. At this point, the coronavirus has barely reached the 1% mark in comparison to how many people will die of the flu this season. Obviously, this could be the "tip of the iceberg" so to speak, or it could be that the panic that has set is all in the minds of people looking for a reason to panic.

But this comparison to the flu and a calm demeanor that coronavirus is not likely to be a global killer (like Ebola) is the very message our own doctors have provided us when we talked about the coronavirus recently.

China is the origin of the virus and still accounts for over 80 percent of cases and deaths. But its cases peaked and began ­declining more than a month ago, according to data presented by the Canadian epidemiologist who spearheaded the World Health Organization’s coronavirus mission to China. Fewer than 200 new cases are reported daily, down from a peak of 4,000.

Subsequent countries will follow this same pattern, in what’s called Farr’s Law. First formulated in 1840 and ignored in ­every epidemic hysteria since, the law states that epidemics tend to rise and fall in a roughly symmetrical pattern or bell-shaped curve. AIDS, SARS, Ebola — they all followed that pattern. So does seasonal flu each year.

If this is true (and is there any real reason not to believe it is?) then we are probably about a month or so from the peak, before things start to diminish. Given our response will be vastly superior (for a variety of reasons) than China's response, we may never actually see the amount of deaths that China had. While it's true that we are probably still on the way "up" in terms of the bell curve, there is going to be a time where the virus starts to wobble.

Like the flu, the coronavirus is afflicting high-risk groups: the elderly, those with ­underlying health conditions like diabetes or heart disease and those with compromised immune systems. Are there exceptions? Sure. But that’s the case with almost every complex biological phenomenon of the kind.

More good news. This month, the Northern Hemisphere, which includes the countries with the most cases, starts heating up. Almost all respiratory viruses hate warm and moist weather. That’s why flu dies out in America every year by May at the latest and probably why Latin America has reported only 25 coronavirus cases. The Philippines, where I live, has about a third of the US population, but it’s so damned hot and humid here, so far we have had no confirmed cases of internal transmission.

Well we cannot be sure (or not) if this will be the case. The Swine flu was active throughout the Summer months (albeit at at reduced rate) and it's certainly reasonable to believe that the coronavirus will remain active for a while. But the fact that this is hitting us a little "late" in the season (cold and flu season in the U.S. is generally considered late fall and winter) is likely going to help reduce the spread.

Now obviously, everyone is an expert (right?). People who were experts in Russian propaganda, went to experts in economics, and are now experts in viruses and how they spread. So you have to take most everything you read with a grain of salt. But at this point I find it much harder to swallow the panic that is out there, especially after talking to my own healthcare professionals and others I know in that particular field.

Lastly, the reality is that this has become political. There are literally liberals out there who genuinely seem to be rooting for this virus to spread, for little other reason that they hope it can harm Trump and his reelection chances. Certainly they believe that the trade off of a few thousand dead Americans can certainly be justified if it means Trump loses the election. On the flip side, if this coronavirus is controlled to a large degree, and we end up with reason to believe that the panic was misplaced, it's only going to help the President come November.