Been seeing a lot of people debating (arguing) over COVID-45 math. It’s always people downplaying the threat, puffing out their chests, demanding their spa day or beer fest (their “freedom”), and they throw around some minuscule percentages to support their positions. Problem is, they simply don’t know basic math. And they’re so damn proud of their ignorance.
Let me start by pointing out that 0.01 is not 1/10 of 1%. It’s just not! I’ll offer proof later.
A couple of important notes when discussing COVID rates:
– Our data is incomplete. In the grand scheme of things, we know diddly squat! We have no clue how many cases there were before we starting recognizing them. How many people went to the doctor with symptoms in January and February that were not even considered as possible COVID infections?
– Less than 2% of Americans have been tested.
What we do “know” (numbers taken from Johns Hopkins this evening)
– There have been 6,231,182 tests to date.
– 17.16% of tests were positive (we could get into a whole other discussion over possible interpretations of that little nugget), resulting in:
– 1,069,424 confirmed cases in the US.
– These cases fit into one of two categories, active or resolved.
– A case can be resolved in only one of two ways, the patient has either recovered or they have died.
– 852,481 cases are active and 216,943 have been resolved.
Active cases shouldn’t be considered in death count percentages because we have no idea how these cases will ultimately resolve. They’re ongoing, TBD, not concluded, still unresolved…
Of the resolved cases:
153,947 survivors have recovered (71%)
62,996 souls have perished (29%)
29% OF COMPLETED CASES HAVE RESULTED IN DEATH!
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Basic math lesson:
1) Can we agree that there are 100 pennies in a dollar?
2) Can we agree then that one penny is 1% of a dollar?
3) Can we agree that a whole dollar is written as $1.00?
4) Can we agree that a penny is written as 0.01?
Conclusion #1: 1% is written as 0.01. 5% is 0.05, etc.
Conclusion #2: If you disagree, you should go back to 5th grade (or refrain from publishing your ignorance, ffs).