Will we have football in the fall?

[Columbuseer]

I also saw a epidemiologist study saying infection rate for those under 70 is only .04%

I checked Ohio data and an estimate of infection rate under 65 is about 0.16%, so that seems reasonable.
For some reason, children seem to be less prone to infection.
For Ohio, ages 25 thru 65 have an estimated 0.48% infection rate., which are 28,500 infections.

I suspect that the low infection rate was due to the aggressive action by the Feds and States to social distance and wear masks (and of course stopping flights from China. If we had only known to stop flights from Europe at the same time).

Humans inherently have issues assessing and responding appropriately to risk that is less than 1%. See my example about flying if airlines had the same death rate. The longer one goes without being infected, the stronger the COVID19 mental fatigue becomes.

I am also concerned that many folks may have misinterpreted "Flattening the curve" as reducing the presence of the virus. It was all about managing hospital resources (beds, ICUs, ventilators, etc.). The virus is still here, and it is still infecting people in tropical climates, so it is more resilient to heat compared to flu.

Then folks start gathering in bunches without masks because they think "well it's been 4 months and I haven't gotten infected yet").I am seeing it happen in Ohio, more so in Walmart than in Meijer or Costco based on anecdotal observation.

COVID19 is much more contagious than flu. From February through today it is the leading cause of death from disease in the world, surpassing malaria.There is a great animated graph that shows the list of diseases and how COVID19 climbs from the bottom of the chart to the top in that time period. Don't have the link.
Also a very expensive way to die (or survive) if hospitalized.

We have to open the economy or we face economic collapse so we must accept greater deaths and infections. Due to COVID19 and social unrest, I have great concern that the world will move away from the dollar as the world monetary standard. Few people recognize the permanent damage that could do to our economy. Don't look for mainstream media to discuss this or our huge debt anytime soon.


IMHO social distancing and masks are here to stay until a vaccine is proven. We will see an increase in the infection rate above .4% if these guidelines are not followed.
Already happening in tourist states.

[NWFanatic]

I also saw a epidemiologist study saying infection rate for those under 70 is only .04%

[SW_Mustang]

Snip

Nice write up! Some numbers in there I hadn't considered.

[Columbuseer]

Major points:
1. If you get so ill you have to go to hospital, then chance of dying is 5 to 10 times more likely for people between 30 and 59.If you survive you are going to be staring at a huge medical bill.
One person spent 30 days in ICU ventilator, etc. - Bill was $1.1M. Hope folks have a good insurance plan, for patients often spend 10 days in hospital.
2. For the 30-39 group, a mortality rate of 0.2% seems insignificant. Would you fly, if there were a 0.2% chance of the plane crashing? (that would mean 88 crashes daily with 5400 deaths).
3. The use of masks is primarily to keep people who are positive (asymptomatic or symptomatic) from spreading the disease by stopping the water droplets. The N95 mask filters down to .3 microns. COVID is .2 microns.
4. 6 ft social distancing is insufficient when people are yelling and screaming as during sporting events.
5. Young people may not die but they could spread the disease to older loved ones.
6. Young people get to pay off the increased Medicare and Medicaid bills through future taxes. BTW Social security funds are exhausted in 2035 as it is underfunded by 16 Trillion dollars. Medicare's hospital fund will be exhausted by 2026 (before COVID).Medicaid in OHIO ALONE is $28B per year (Before COVID). Add to that the national debt at 25 Trillion dollars which is 125% of GDP. We cannot afford another total shutdown.

So it is in everyone's best interest, both from a financial and health perspective, to be aggressive in stopping the spread of COVID.


Here are actual numbers from the State of Ohio Department of Health as of 6/23/20.
Look at Age Group and Chance of Dying if Infected (%) and change of dying if hospitalized(%).
Age 30: .2% 4.0%
Age 40: .5% 5.4%
Age 50: 2.2% 12.4%
Age 60: 6.8% 24.2%
Age 70: 17.3% 47.2%
Age 80: 32.2% 103.4% (> 100% due to people dying before getting to hospital or in nursing home)

[SW_Mustang]

Arkansas governor just said that 70% of deaths in the state are from people 65+. 40% of deaths in NY alone were nursing home infections. Not trying to diminish those deaths at all but to look at those numbers and act like this virus is killing otherwise healthy people is disingenuous. Antibody tests across the country from several major cities showed asymptomatic infections in the population 10-20x the rate of tested and confirmed infections. I understand administrators will want to be on the safe side when it comes to students and student athletes but this virus panic is being fueled by media hysteria. It is time to get on with life and let people decide for themselves the level of risk they want to take.

I was just sharing the hard numbers. COVID-19 has killed more people in a shorter period of time than the flu did this year. That being said, as you pointed out there is a lot more to the numbers than what can be determined on the surface. I'm not qualified to analyze or speculate on that data, that's why I said it's an apples-to-oranges comparison. I just wanted to get the correct numbers out there to at least show, like I said, that COVID-19 has killed more people than the flu in 2020.

In a "perfect" world, I would agree with you. We would all be responsible for ourselves and make our own choices based on what's best for us. My only problem with that line of thinking is that life doesn't work that way. Vulnerable people can't simply exit society on a moment's notice just so the rest of us can do as we please. Life is also too complex to boil it down to an over-simplification like that. There are way too many variables at play.

Now, that being said - do I agree with all the shutdowns and regulations? Not necessarily. I don't have anything to back this up, but I think our infrastructure (at least locally) has been reinforced to the point where we can start to slowly regain our normal lives back. Shutting everything down until the virus "goes away" is not a viable option, so there has to be a compromise. Have some people hijacked it for political gain? Possibly - but I don't pay attention to those angles because everything gets politicized these days.

[West Florida]

To quote the great Hamilton "Ham" Porter, " PLAAAAAAAAYYYY BAAAAALLLLLLLLL!!!!"

[codeblack]

It's an A/O comparison - but here are the numbers:

Seasonal Flu (2020)
Season: October 2019 - April 2020
Duration: 5 mos
Case Count (High Estimate): 52,000,000
Death Count (High Estimate): 62,000

COVID-19
Season: February 2020 (first death) - June 2020* (present day)
Duration: 4 mos
Case Count: 2,400,157*
Death Count: 122,877*

*as of 11:55 AM CT 6/23/2020

Source: CDC (seasonal flu), Worldometer (COVID-19)

The nice thing is, our fatality rate has dropped significantly - however spikes in the death rate always lag behind spikes in case count by a couple weeks, so we'll have to see what happens moving forward.

Arkansas governor just said that 70% of deaths in the state are from people 65+. 40% of deaths in NY alone were nursing home infections. Not trying to diminish those deaths at all but to look at those numbers and act like this virus is killing otherwise healthy people is disingenuous. Antibody tests across the country from several major cities showed asymptomatic infections in the population 10-20x the rate of tested and confirmed infections. I understand administrators will want to be on the safe side when it comes to students and student athletes but this virus panic is being fueled by media hysteria. It is time to get on with life and let people decide for themselves the level of risk they want to take.

[Columbuseer]

Given the characteristics of COVID, I just don't see how one can avoid at least one positive test every 2 or 3 weeks among 100+ players and staff. Social distancing seems to be inherently problematic in football. resulting quarantine of contacts would seem to derail a game for 14 days.

[SW_Mustang]

snip

It's an A/O comparison - but here are the numbers:

Seasonal Flu (2020)
Season: October 2019 - April 2020
Duration: 5 mos
Case Count (High Estimate): 52,000,000
Death Count (High Estimate): 62,000

COVID-19
Season: February 2020 (first death) - June 2020* (present day)
Duration: 4 mos
Case Count: 2,400,157*
Death Count: 122,877*

*as of 11:55 AM CT 6/23/2020

Source: CDC (seasonal flu), Worldometer (COVID-19)

The nice thing is, our fatality rate has dropped significantly - however spikes in the death rate always lag behind spikes in case count by a couple weeks, so we'll have to see what happens moving forward.

[WarriorVoice]

thousands die of the flu yearly(even with a vaccine) so I see no need to tie a vaccine to sports

[NWFanatic]

thousands die of the flu yearly(even with a vaccine) so I see no need to tie a vaccine to sports

[UWFMubbish]

Hate to sound callous, but I think football season will move forward. Unless hospitalization and death rears it's ugly head, major college football will push through. Let a big name player ( a headline grabber) have serious issues or a couple of players pass away (praying for neither), then MAYBE the season will be shortened or cancelled. As for spectators, that's still up in the air. But healthy athletes who bounce back quickly or are asymptomatic, that's just enough for the big money train to proceed. Will FCS, DII, DIII, NAIA, and JUCO follow big money's lead, that is a good question...

[Packfootball]

If I was a betting man, I'd put odds 5:3 we don't.

I think you are right. The symptom's between Covid 19 and the regular flu are about the same. Flu shots are about 3 months away. 19 shots are a question mark. With student athletes starting to show up at universities and colleges we will find out which athletes have 19 and how quickly it spreads. I do believe fall camps will be cut short and the football season will not happen. I hope for the best for the student athletes this summer and fall.

[Wide_Right]

If I was a betting man, I'd put odds 5:3 we don't.

[WarriorVoice]

Couple of points/questions:

1. Since we seem either unwilling or unable to track recoveries with any degree of accuracy, the metric I track is deaths. From the several tracking sites I've looked at, deaths from Covid are trending down, From April 21 when we had the daily high of 2,693 deaths the line has been "death line" has been heading down pretty dramatically. Yesterdays one day reported deaths of 267 was the lowest one day death total since March 23 (180 deaths).

2. Much has been said about case "spikes" and "new hot spots" with a lot of focus being on Florida, Oklahoma and NC. Worth pointing out that the hottest of the new hot spots is California with 5 straight days at 3500 new cases reported.

3. Buuuutttt...Even though several states are seeing a spike in new cases, these spikes pail in comparison to the 12,000+ new cases we were seeing regularly from NY and NJ during the height of their outbreaks.

4. Opinion here. The quarantine was intended to do a couple of things. Chief among those was to buy us time so we better understood just what Covid was and who in our communities were the most at risk. I think it achieved that pretty well. Also, it was intended to buy us time so we could develop an acurate method of testing and effective treatment protocols for people who who contract the virus. I don't think quarantine was ever intended to be a steady state for the country as a whole but certain segments of the population would be wise to adhere to most of the restrictions (let's call that quarantine lite).

1 & 2 In April Covid was strong in WA, and the NE. We went through 3 months of quarantine, flattening our curve while the rest of the country was just seeing their first cases. Now 17 states have rising hospitalizations, which we now know only happens in serious cases. 11 states just reported record daily case numbers. With the exceptions of Florida and California, many of those states are seeing THEIR first spikes.

3. Per the Financial Times rolling 7 day average, US cases are now rising again...

4. I agree, but what do we do when all of the hospital beds are taken by Covid patients?!