woodguru

An argument over whether the death counts are reported accurately is inevitable, it's already happening...

The fact of the matter is that the actual count is completely irrelevant politically, except to Trump who seems to feel that the count is relevant as a measure of "his" success...which it is not.

What is happening in terms of numbers is about steps that have been taken, and in the end it will make no difference if we are at 20,000 or 40,000 except to Trump in his head.

But my point here is how simple it would be for the federal government to have really accurate numbers of deaths. Reporting has choke points where information can be reported and gathered. Accurate numbers are incredibly important for researchers to be able to assess and anticipate new potentially likely new outbreaks so as to jump into the area with more effective testing and quarantine work.

Here's an accurate collection point...EMT's reporting deaths that they have picked up that are possibly to likely Coronavirus. This catches a ton of cases that have not necessarily been tested that are not being counted now. CDC, compiling these numbers can run a modified number based on statistical home deaths. Like New York City typically has about 20/25, but now is closer to 200, so the modified Corona deaths is far more accurate than the number that is not being counted now.

The way Covid deaths are being reported now is all about politics and optics, testing is not where it should be because numbers would be dramatically higher.

Here's another factor I was thinking about that has to do with false negatives, which look far too high considering the standard for being tested anyway makes it a higher likelihood to have it than if testing were more widely done. People test negative and then die they are not counted as a Covid death because they were not verified.

It doesn't matter what the final tally of deaths we end up with, it is all exactly the same in terms of accountability.

Oh, and one more area of transparency needed is how bad the problem is in nursing homes, which should be reporting to both medicare system and CDC, which is absolutely not happening.

Boo_Boo Loc: Jellystone

An accurate count may not matter to most people, but for our medical community it measures the virus and effectiveness of treatment. As it stands, all deaths in the USA are in question. Morgue technicians and corners are being told to count anyone who dies who has the trace markers for the SIF Chinese virus as death due to the virus. This means counting false positives and current tests are reported to be 80 percent WRONG!

woodguru

Actually, and this proves that the argument is already being made on FOX and MSM, many states are going the other way which is to use the existing condition such as heart problems, pneumonia that can result from Intubation, emphysema, etc.

The debate is between whether someone with Covid is reported as a Covid death or the underlying condition. What does a hospital do if they say the person obviously has Covid So we won't test, or the person who is sick at home obviously with Covid, and is refused a test, then dies at home? It is not an obvious way it is being handled and it simply needs to be counted one way.

Covid is proving to kill many people who drop dead of a heart attack after being in recovery stage, it that a death by heart attack or do you call it a Covid death? It is likelier that the person would not have died if they hadn't gotten it.

Here's where the federal government can make a difference by setting the ground rules people will use to make the call on cause of death. That keeps different states setting different rules.

Covid is killing a lot of people right now that are not being counted, and my point is that the right and Trump seem to be more attached to the less is better metric even if it isn't accurate. And my point is that the less is better mindset is not counting many areas that are Covid deaths.

The right wants to make the argument that deaths that are something else are being assigned to Covid, and the opposite is the truth, that many areas are giving the benefit of the doubt to other causes unless there has been a test verification. And testing is way lower numbers among even people likely to have it than it should be.

Sew_What

It is a tough call:

When I was in high school, I had a couple of teachers that brought up the body counts during the Vietnam War...in that they kept track of them. They joked that if you had taken the counts and annualized the data the US Army would have wiped the Vietcong many times over.

Hence, was born my interest in Statistics and less so in history.

I work with warranty data, and the big question is how do you figure out when the warranty will end?

The Weibull analysis is the best method, in that it incorporates empirical as well as statistical inference. There are very precise approaches to understand whether components (such as bearings, resistors, fasteners) are performing to their design and other methods to analysis assemblies (four bar mechanisms, release handles, throttles, brake calipers and so on). In the end, the only method that works the best is understanding a population and collecting data from that population. It is difficult to provide empirical choices to what appear to be "normal" populations. For instance, recently, blacks have been identified as the biggest at risk population and justified by per capita comparisons. As in Detroit, where 80% of the population is black, I would the numbers to be very high-but compared to the rest of the state, it is meaningless as the death rate climbs in rural areas.

I guess what I'm saying is: we have to understand the rate, that is the best method for now....and in my opinion, until we possess a vaccine, stay home. No amount of statistics, however carefully managed will bear the real fruit to end this.

Rose42

The right is blah, blah, blah. SSDD

The fact is, many deaths are listed as COVID when they are not. You're going to have to face reality one day. Sure people die at home but you're assuming its from the virus when people have always died at home from various conditions.

On their site the CDC has guidelines for what to put on death certificates. It pretty much says if there's a suspicion then put the cause of death as the virus.

Open. Your. Eyes.

Sew_What

Yes, that medical billing coding is a bit broad. I guess because no corpses pay their "pay there own way", it's a easy way to make some money.