The death rate is the simplified term for the case fatality rate.
The Case Fatality Rate (CFR)
The CFR is the number of deaths for a specific disease divided by all the same conditions. It is multiplied by 100 to produce a percentage.
Death rate = Case Fatality Rate = [the number of deaths divided by the total number of cases] x 100
The total number of cases is the denominator. It includes all the infected, whether they are mild, moderate, critical, and dead.
Example: City A or country A has 100 cases of Covid-19. So far, there has been 1 death. What is the death rate?
The number who have died for Covid-19 = 1
Total number of all cases of Covid-19 – 100
Deaths/ Total number of cases – 1/100 = 0.01
Multiply by 100 to get a percentage of 0.01 x 100 = 1% death rate of Covid-19 for City A or Country A
Death rates can also be calculated across time. For example, the daily, weekly, or monthly death rates can be calculated for comparison as time goes and analyzed to see if the public health measures are effective.
As you can see, the death rate can be calculated for the whole world, or it can be calculated per country, or city, or by any locale. Death rates tell a lot.
What factors affect the death rate?
- How deadly is the disease?
- How many people are at risk of dying from the disease?
- How good is the health care system? Are there enough health care workers, hospitals, and medical equipment?
- Government response
- What people will do with the information
What affects the final number of the death rate?
The Disease
Some viruses are so deadly that even with the best care, many will die. That could be because there is no known treatment for that disease. An example is Ebola that has a death rate of 25-90%. Some infections like seasonal flu are relatively mild, with a death rate of 0.1%. Meaning only 1 in 1,000 infected will die from the flu at a “regular” flu season. The Covid-19 death rate is currently at 3.7% globally.
Number of people at-risk
How many people are at risk for the disease? Who are the people more likely to die from it? For Covid-19, a study has shown that it is the elderly and people with underlying medical problems.
Underlying medical problems include heart and lung disease, cancer, and diabetes, to mention some. The reason why is explained here, Who Dies From the Coronavirus? And here, What Happens to Critically-ill Covid-19 patients?.
Smokers are also likely to get the virus since smoking increases the ACE2 receptors of the lungs where the virus sticks to. Once the Covid-19 are in the lungs, they rapidly multiply.
The financially poor or the ones without access to health care are also vulnerable.
If the population affected has a high number of at-risk people, more people will have serious rather than mild disease. Severe cases have higher mortality.
An example is Italy, where the number of people older than 65 are 22% in 2018. Smokers in Italy are 23.7% in 2015. In China, 52% of men and 27% of women smoke.
Italy has a Covid-19 death rate of 6.7%, and China has 3.9%.
Health Care system
The quality of the health care system is critical for the treatment of the population. This includes the number of doctors and nurses, their laboratories’ quality to make the right diagnosis, the number of hospital beds, and life-saving equipment like ventilators.
A well-functioning system may look like it can handle an epidemic easily, but not all the time.
Italy has one of the best health systems in the world. But since the epidemic started, they have been overwhelmed by the number of sick patients.
It is so bad in Italy that the doctors have to face the hard decision to treat because of the deluge of patients faced with rapidly depleting medical supplies and equipment.
Italy has to make retired physicians go back to work and graduate nursing students earlier to meet patients’ surge.
As the epidemic goes on, the exposure to the virus and the stress of work can affect the doctors and nurses and get them sick. Some may die. In China, nearly 3,400 got ill, and 13 have passed away.
An infected health worker will put them out of commission for 2 weeks. That means the remaining ones that are already overworked will have to increase their effort and pick up the slack. The increased stress lowers their immune system and puts them at risk, too, like their patients.
That is why health workers should stay healthy during the epidemic.
Government response
The reaction of the government to an epidemic is critical. They decide if and when isolation or quarantine should be done. If the government is slow and isolation is late, then the outbreak would have spread.
Government rules and regulations should be flexible for the times. An example will be the policies to satisfy the increased demand for testing kits.
If unrealistic policies hamper the laboratories, then test kits won’t be available to the public even if they already exist.
Policies on who to test are also vital. If the testing requirements are rigid or not based on the evolving knowledge about the virus, then the sick cases will not be identified.
If the government rules are ineffective, then the number of infected and the ones they will affect and the severe cases and deaths will increase.
What can regular people do to decrease the death rate?
Regular people can not make changes in government policies. At least not right away. The majority do not have the training to be health professionals.
But, we can prevent ourselves and others from getting sick by social distancing. Stay away from others.
That way, fewer people will get seriously ill and not overwhelm the system.
It is very likely that here in the U.S., the virus has already spread in the community. At the rate we are going. It is doubtful that enough test kits will be made available. Dr. Anthony Fauci, the top infectious disease expert at the National Institutes of Health, said this about testing,
“The system is not really geared to what we need right now,” “That is a failing. It is a failing, let’s admit it.”
If so, mass testing may be too late to catch up with the spread.
We can lower infection transmission by simple hand-washing, wearing a mask, especially if you are sick.
We can lower the exposure of vulnerable people by minimizing contact when needed. Video chats and phone calls can substitute.
In summary, anyone can lower the death rate by doing simple things.
- Wash the hands frequently
- Avoid touching the face.
- Practice social isolation. Stay away from crowds.
- Self-isolate when sick
- Disinfect your surroundings as needed with safe disinfectants’
- If you are taking supplements to prevent infections, make sure there is sound science behind them.
- Wear a mask when sick or if you are around at-risk people
- Call your doctor if the symptoms get worse.
- Minimize unnecessary contact with at-risk people.
- Children who go to school interact with others that may be asymptomatic carriers. Please don’t make them spread the virus to their grandparents.
People may have the best scientific medical advice in the world, but what they will do with that information will determine this epidemic’s course.
At the end of the day, it is not the test, not the doctors, not the hospital or the government that will save us but our individual selves.
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Don’t Get Sick!
Related readings:
- The Complete Covid-19 Articles
- Covid-19: Why Should Health Care Workers be Protected?
- The Covid-19 can Attack the Brain
- New Study Explains the Rapid Spread of Covid-19
- 6 Disinfectants for the Home against the Coronavirus
- 5 Hand Disinfectants for Coronavirus You May not Know
- What Happens to Critically-ill Covid-19 patients?
- 6 Ways Exercise Protects against Infections
- Not enough U.S. hospital beds once the Covid-19 epidemic is full-blown
- Is the Covid-19 epidemic Fake News?
- The Secondary Attack Rate of Covid-19
- Thermometer Guns are Inaccurate for Covid-19 Screening
- Covid-19 Can Cause Drugs and Medical Supply Shortages Worldwide
- Covid-19 and Pets
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