According to research published in the New England Journal of Medicine, most people getting sick and/or dying from the coronavirus are elderly with a median age of 59, while those most vulnerable to seasonal flu are the very young and people 65 and older.
A detailed study of the first 425 coronavirus cases diagnosed in Wuhan, China, found no cases in people younger than 15. That’s either because youngsters are less likely to get it or have symptoms so mild they go undetected, according to Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, Director of the National Institutes of Health’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.
Fauci co-authored an editorial in the New England Journal of Medicine detailing what has been learned by studying those earliest cases.
How deadly is the coronavirus disease compared to seasonal flu?
Unclear infection rates influence efforts to determine how deadly COVID-19 might be. In severe years of seasonal flu, about 0.1% percent of people die. Fauci said death rates from the coronavirus may be considerably less than one percent if more people have it than are getting diagnosed.
In diagnosed cases, the New England Journal of Medicine has published research finding that 1.4% patients with laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 die, while coronavirus cases including pneumonia have a death rate of roughly 2%.
The World Health Organization says the coronavirus crude mortality ratio is between is 3-4%.
How contagious is coronavirus compared to flu?
Looking at those earliest cases, infected people spread the ailment to another 2.2 people on average, while people suffering from flu pass it on to roughly another 1.3 people.
How severe are cases of infection comparing coronavirus and flu?
Coronavirus hits harder, according to the World Health Organization’s website that states:
“While the range of symptoms for the two viruses is similar, the fraction with severe disease appears to be different. For COVID-19, data to date suggest that 80% of infections are mild or asymptomatic, 15% are severe infection requiring oxygen and 5% are critical infections requiring ventilation. These fractions of severe and critical infection would be higher than what is observed for influenza infection.”
Both ailments are spread and best prevented by avoiding exposure. That can be accomplished, in part, by frequent hand-washing and not touching your face.
- Coronavirus FAQs
- First positive test for coronavirus confirmed in Virginia
- Hundreds who visited DC church asked to self-quarantine after rector tests positive for coronavirus
- Latest coronavirus test results in DC, Maryland and Virginia
- ‘Several’ lawmakers had contact with person who got COVID-19
