I didn't realize how bad this pandemic was until I looked up the average number of people who get the flu each year. The average comes out to 28,544,444 between the 2010 and 2019 cold and flu seasons. Should CV19 have a mortality rate of the current 1.5% number being reported (source below), then we're looking at 428,166 people getting killed by this thing based on the average rate of flu infections each year. That's 1126% what the flu kills on average (38,023).

Even at the low-end 0.75% mortality rate South Korea experienced (who has about 4x the hospital capacity per capita as the US) we're still looking at 214,083. That low-end is still 5.6x the number of people the flu kills in a given year.

Also worth noting... the above is just using the average flu infection rates over the past decade (28.5M). If this new bug spreads more widely than then flu, then the the number of dead is going to skyrocket.

Case in point, California is already projecting a 56% rate of infection over the next 8 weeks making this MUCH more virulent/contagious. 56% of California's population amounts to ~25.5M infected. That gives us an estimated number of dead at:

191,250 - 382,500

And that's just in California in the next 2 months if extraordinary steps are not taken to limit the spread of infection.

When people ask what's up with this bug, feel free to send them this post.

Sources: www.worldometers.info/coronavirus www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/2018-2019.html www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/2017-2018.htm www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/2016-2017.html www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/2015-2016.html www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/2014-2015.html www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/2013-2014.html www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/2012-2013.html www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/2011-2012.html www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/2010-2011.html thehill.com/policy/defense/488547-california-projects-56-percent-of-the-population-will-be-infected-over-8-week data.worldbank.org/indicator/sh.med.beds.zs