Important read in The Atlantic "A New Statistic Reveals Why America's COVID-19 Numbers Are Flat"

[NRaleighLiberal]

Was cross referenced at TPM - https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/good-article

here is the article - https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2020/04/us-coronavirus-outbreak-out-control-test-positivity-rate/610132/

Few figures tell you anything useful about how the coronavirus has spread through the U.S. Here’s one that does.

How many people have the coronavirus in the United States? More than two months into the country’s outbreak, this remains the most important question for its people, schools, hospitals, and businesses. It is also still among the hardest to answer. At least 630,000 people nationwide now have test-confirmed cases of COVID-19, according to The Atlantic’s COVID Tracking Project, a state-by-state tally conducted by more than 100 volunteers and experts. But an overwhelming body of evidence shows that this is an undercount.

Whenever U.S. cities have tested a subset of the general population, such as homeless people or pregnant women, they have found at least some infected people who aren’t showing symptoms. And, as ProPublica first reported, there has been a spike in the number of Americans dying at home across the country. Those people may die of COVID-19 without ever entering the medical system, meaning that they never get tested.

snip

According to the Tracking Project’s figures, nearly one in five people who get tested for the coronavirus in the United States is found to have it. In other words, the country has what is called a “test-positivity rate” of nearly 20 percent.

That is “very high,” Jason Andrews, an infectious-disease professor at Stanford, told us. Such a high test-positivity rate almost certainly means that the U.S. is not testing everyone who has been infected with the pathogen, because it implies that doctors are testing only people with a very high probability of having the infection. People with milder symptoms, to say nothing of those with none at all, are going undercounted. Countries that test broadly should encounter far more people who are not infected than people who are, so their test-positivity rate should be lower.

snip

well worth reading it all

[uponit7771]

1. ✨✨✨THIS IS SCARY !!!✨✨✨ Yes, we should ... NOT ... have a consistent 20% positive rate

... and in NY the epicenter of the outbreak on planet earth people are still not tested unless they have severe symptoms.

This is scary

[ThoughtCriminal]

2. After it is all over, they will look at the spike in the overall mortality statistics

and probably find that the actual number of deaths much higher than the official count.

[roamer65]

3. I swear I had this thing in early January.

It’s been here longer than we know. Someone infected hopped a plane in November and brought it here.

I really wish I could get an antibody test. I’d love to give plasma to help someone if I test positive.

[jimlup]

4. Thanks for the link

We are only now getting the scientific data on this monster virus. We need to ramp up our testing by orders of magnitude.