"Why do tens of thousands of people die every year influenza 4 ? The new coronavirus is not as harmful as the flu, but it is so nervous?"
COVID-19 epidemic continues to spread, and our country is mobilizing the whole country to curb it, but there is a widespread circulating in the market that the above COVID-19 epidemic is not as harmful as the flu, and it is not worthy of such tension and "great war".
Among them, Huawei Yu Chengdong 's remarks are the most widely circulated.
Is this true?
In fact, this statement concentrates on people's misunderstandings about the dual flu and COVID-19.
Seasonal influenza, causing hundreds of thousands of deaths worldwide every year
"Ten thousand deaths of influenza every year", some seem to feel that it is already shocking.
However, this statement underestimates the flu too much.
Influenza is indeed an infectious disease and does cause a certain proportion of deaths.
There are two epidemic patterns in the presence of influenza: seasonal epidemic, and pandemic.
Seasonal influenza, also known as winter influenza, is prevalent in the northern and southern hemispheres every year, and is prevalent in the periequatorial area all year round.
Even if there is only a seasonal epidemic, the number of infections caused worldwide each year is immeasurable. The number of serious cases alone is as high as 3 million to 5 million, which eventually leads to hundreds of thousands of deaths.
A study published by the U.S. CDC in 2019 on the Lancet believes that 290,000 to 650,000 people die from influenza each year worldwide.
That is to say, the mortality rate among 3 million to 5 million severe influenza patients each year is about 10%.
influenza pandemic, the catastrophe of humans
influenza pandemic, usually due to a new variant strain that has not been popular in the population before, which can trigger a global pandemic across seasons and regions.
Because the newly mutated virus is brand new and the global population has not been exposed to it, it is generally susceptible, which can often cause infection to almost everyone in the world (the flu epidemic is like sieving in the population, and the "sieve holes" of the new strain are particularly large, and most people will fall into it) , causing the death of millions or even tens of millions of people.
In the past 20th century, there were three global influenza pandemics, namely:
1918 Spanish influenza , which is estimated to cause about 20 million to 100 million deaths.
1957 Asian flu first occurred in Guizhou, my country, killing 1 million to 1.5 million people.
In 1968, the Hong Kong flu killed about 75 to 1 million people.
Entering the new century, the influenza A in 2009 has killed up to about 400,000 people worldwide.
The flu is so bad, why aren’t people nervous?
"not nervous", first of all, people do not have enough understanding of the harm of influenza.
Scientists, especially scientists who study infectious diseases, are nervous every year, fearing that if you are not careful, a global flu pandemic will occur again, and humans will experience a comprehensive "baptism" again.
The tension among scientists and the medical community is also reflected in the fact that before the flu season every year, the agency in charge is loudly calling for people to get influenza vaccination, and repeatedly reminding people to wash their hands frequently during the flu season to avoid crowds, etc., etc.
People often ignore it.
Have the readers noticed the topic's statement "limited preventive measures"?
What does this mean?
This is also the most fundamental reason why people are not nervous:
is "not nervous" because influenza is an out-of-control epidemic
What is the word that people hear the most at the beginning of this outbreak of the new coronavirus?
"preventable and controllable", four big words.
Now, do you think these four words are a little unfamiliar?
is correct.
No one has been saying these four words for a long time.
Because the reality is that the epidemic in Wuhan and even Hubei has fallen out of control for a while, and it has not been considered as basically recovering lost ground in recent days and re-setting defenses - Wuhan has adopted isolation measures such as community closure management.
For influenza, it is an out-of-control epidemic. In addition to the vaccines that require repeated injections every year, humans have almost given up their desire to control the epidemic.
Because scientists know that the epidemic feature of its widespread community infection determines that it is almost impossible to fully control the flu for now.
The reason is that, first, the influenza virus mutations are too frequent. It always mutates before people adapt (infect or vaccinate, and it produces resistance).
Second, humans themselves are the host of influenza viruses. Influenza viruses parasitize in the human body like migratory birds and continue to spread among the global population as the seasons transform.
People are almost completely powerless about it.
Since it is uncontrollable, the only option for humans to treat influenza is to take "appropriate" prevention like the arrival of winter. Besides, the rest is to accept it without being nervous.
What's the difference between being nervous or not?
Is the COVID-19 epidemic worth the nervousness? It's like the prelude to an influenza pandemic
The new crown epidemic in Wuhan swept across the country in just 2 months, causing more than 60,000 infections and more than 1,500 deaths.
Why is the epidemic developing so rapidly?
The biggest reason is that like the new mutant influenza virus that can cause a global pandemic, this is a brand new virus that humans have never been exposed to, and the entire population is generally susceptible.
Second, like influenza, there are a large number of mild and asymptomatic infections in the patients. These people are not easily detected even if they are sick. They can still move normally in the population and cause transmission without realizing it.
Third, highly contagious. It has now been confirmed that the novel coronavirus can be transmitted through respiratory droplets (including close-range aerosol ), contact, and potential long-distance aerosols.
In particular, even if the strictest protection is carried out, a large proportion of medical staff are still infected. This shows that close-range aerosol transmission occupies an important position.
More importantly, some evidence shows that COVID-19 may have difficult community infections.
All these characteristics are very similar to the prelude to the influenza pandemic of a new mutant strain.
Recently, the world is marveling at our country's super mobilization ability. In a country with a population of 1.4 billion, the "drawing of the ground into a prison" style of the whole nation is not only unprecedented, but also with a high probability that there will be no future.
Even so, the control of the epidemic is still not satisfactory, and various parts of the country have upgraded the control measures for the flow of people.
You should know that not any country has the ability to mobilize China and the ability to withstand economic blows to carry out national quarantine.
At present, the epidemic has spread to nearly 30 countries around the world.
Open the world map of the epidemic distribution, and it can be seen that almost all economically developed countries in the world have been "dyeed red", and only economically underdeveloped regions can "clean themselves".
The problem is that what scientists are most worried about now is precisely these unstained red areas. Due to the limited economic and medical resources, once the epidemic breaks out, these areas may directly fall into a state of out-of-control, which will trigger a global pandemic.
What is the scale of this pandemic?
Many scientists use certain mathematical models to make many predictions based on data from certain regions.
For example, taking the "experimental model" of Japan's "Diamond Princess" cruise ship, the entire ship has been quarantined since the early last week was found to have been diagnosed.
To this day, it is estimated that the 14-day quarantine period has just passed half. Among the total 3,700 people, 218 have been confirmed, including 5 severe cases. How many people will eventually be diagnosed when the expected quarantine period expires from February 19?
is now unable to accurately predict.
However, these 3700 people will provide scientists with a very reliable data source for pandemic assessments to predict potential global pandemics.
Some predictions and even believe that if the epidemic cannot be effectively controlled, there is a possibility of a global pandemic.
The destructive power at that time may be no less than or even higher than a flu pandemic.
Now, do you think the COVID-19 epidemic is worth the stress?
WHO will give up the comprehensive containment strategy at any time and turn to a limited defense strategy against influenza
WHO recently held an emergency meeting on COVID-19 at its headquarters Geneva . After the new knowledge about COVID-19 obtained in 2 months, the WHO Infectious Disease Science and Technology Advisory Group (STAG-IH) believes that COVID-19 is very different from SARS that occurred in my country in 2002. The clinical and epidemiological characteristics are more similar to the traditional coronavirus that can cause the common cold in humans. It is not prone to severe symptoms in the early stage of infection but is already contagious, so it can cause widespread transmission; severe symptoms usually occur when the mild symptoms are maintained at 7 and 8, and then develop into a fatal acute respiratory distress syndrome similar to SARS.
WHO argues that at present, all epidemic areas should still adopt a comprehensive containment strategy based on large isolation, aiming to eliminate this virus from humans;
Once there is evidence that COVID-19 has widespread community transmission, the containment strategy will not be effective in the end, and the strategy can only be changed, just like influenza, adopt a limited defense strategy.
In this regard, the Lancet issued a comprehensive commentary:
Lancet warned: The new coronavirus infection may occur similar to the widespread spread of influenza
The so-called limited defense is tantamount to the containment strategy of comprehensive encirclement and suppression, which is tantamount to "raising the white flag" and allowing it to form a freely spread pandemic.
To put it bluntly, since you can't move, don't carry it, let it go.
