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Question - would it make more sense for the paper/media to report total number of new cases or active cases? Isn’t total number of cases somewhat misl

Posted by JackDawson (aka dawson) Mar 21 '20, 09:44

Misleading?

Those numbers obviously always go up. When you do new cases you start seeing Bell curves rather than vertical arrows

I’m just curious what the justification is for total cases

It’s a good interesting number but says nothing about infection rate growth rate and chances of health care system overwhelming

Thoughts?

Responses:

Given the early nature of the curve, total is important imo. - Will Hunting Mar 21, 10:11 1
- Ok so the two direct responses I’ve gotten are from you and loose and both are “they’re to scare people” - JackDawson Mar 21, 10:14
If it's true fact and not sensationalized, I gots no ish. It morbidly lets you know how many of your loved ones you may want to be calling. -- nm - con_carne Mar 21, 10:00
I don't see a reason not to publish both, including multi-day averages because daily count can be sporadic and imply something good about fewer new - Max Mar 21, 10:00 1
- Well yeah trends and growth rates would be even better but we KNOW total numbers are misleading in most respects vs “maybe one day’s new numbers are o - JackDawson Mar 21, 10:03
The real numbers are never going to happen now per CNN story - Bacon Mar 21, 09:47 11
- There’s no tests what else are they supposed to do? -- nm - JackDawson Mar 21, 09:50 9
  - The number they should be reporting is respiratory condition hospital admissions, regardless of confirmed cause. -- nm - Max Mar 21, 10:01 6
    - Right and capacity / ventilators available, is a coda to my point -- nm - JackDawson Mar 21, 10:03 4
      - Reporting ventilators available would push my anxiety through the roof. I am sure others as wel -- nm - Bacon Mar 21, 10:10 3
        
        As opposed to the anxiety currently caused by the total number ever infected in the history of the virus’ life ever? - JackDawson Mar 21, 10:12 1
        
        I am not saying not to publish it, just that it would cause panic as the number of ventilators available went to zero. -- nm - Bacon Mar 21, 10:16
        
        We're on the Titanic. -- nm - loosilu Mar 21, 10:12
    - Agreed. -- nm - loosilu Mar 21, 10:03
  - Not my point. I agree with them. I am just saying you can't have real hard numbers if everyone isn't tested. -- nm - Bacon Mar 21, 09:52 1
    - BTW I misread your subject line. I thought you were talking about suspected cases vs. positive test cases. I see what you meant now. -- nm - Bacon Mar 21, 09:53
- It makes sense when there is a severe shortage of tests. -- nm - loosilu Mar 21, 09:48
New cases are the number that matters. The angle of that curve tells you how bad it is. So yes, total number is misleading, but if it gets people's attention, I'm ok with it. -- nm* - loosilu Mar 21, 09:45 4
- Getting people’s attention by misleading them is a bad long term idea IMO. If they catch you later...your credibility is shot and then we are in bigge - JackDawson Mar 21, 09:52
- And sudden jumps as testing capacity opens up means that the previous numbers (and any projections derived there from) were bad -- nm - Beryllium Mar 21, 09:47 2
  - Right making the total number just a rather meaningless and misleading statistic -- nm - JackDawson Mar 21, 09:51
  - The lack of testing means we really don't know what we're dealing with. WE're blind. We can't see the real dynamics. -- nm - loosilu Mar 21, 09:48

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Question - would it make more sense for the paper/media to report total number of new cases or active cases? Isn’t total number of cases somewhat misl

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