{"id":51692,"date":"2020-03-09T19:34:07","date_gmt":"2020-03-10T00:34:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=51692"},"modified":"2020-03-09T19:34:12","modified_gmt":"2020-03-10T00:34:12","slug":"were-going-to-have-more-deaths-influenza-kills-more-people-than-the-coronavirus-so-everyone-is-overreacting-right-wrong-and-heres-why","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=51692","title":{"rendered":"\u2018We\u2019re going to have more deaths\u2019: Influenza kills more people than the coronavirus so everyone is overreacting, right? Wrong \u2014 and here\u2019s why"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\u2018We\u2019re going to have more deaths\u2019: Influenza kills more people than the coronavirus so everyone is overreacting, right? Wrong \u2014 and here\u2019s why<\/a><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

President Trump tweeted Monday that thousands die of the flu every year, and suggested that life should go on as usual \u2014 not so fast, experts say<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"\/
Some cite influenza as a reason not to be worried about COVID-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus, but health professionals say that comparison misses some very important points.MarketWatch photo illustration\/iStockphoto<\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Coronavirus. It\u2019s just like the flu, isn\u2019t it? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hundreds of thousands of people die of the flu every year, and people need to calm down, some say. Everyone should wash their hands for 20 seconds,  elbow bump<\/a>, stop buying face masks because they don\u2019t protect against the virus<\/a>, note that airplane air<\/a> is filtered 20 to 30 times an hour, avoid cruise ships<\/a>, and just relax \u2014 right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That appears to be the accumulated advice of exasperated Americans on Twitter and Facebook FB, -6.40%<\/a> in recent days who despair at the long lines at Trader Joe\u2019s and Whole Foods AMZN, -5.28%<\/a> (where people apparently have been stocking up on oat milk<\/a>) and the panic buying and empty shelves at Costco COST, -3.00%<\/a>. \u201cToilet paper is golden in an apocalypse,\u201d one customer told MYNorthwest.com<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018This is additive, not in place of. Yes, the flu kills thousands of people every year, but we\u2019re going to have more deaths.\u2019\u2014 Amesh Adalja, Infectious Diseases Society of America<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Studies, however, suggest the differences between the flu and coronavirus are more nuanced than some people suggest. In fact, health professionals point out important distinctions between the COVID-19 illness and other viral sicknesses like the flu. For a start, there is\u00a0no\u00a0<\/em>vaccine for COVID-19\u00a0and it could take many months or years<\/a>\u00a0to get one to market. What\u2019s worse, doctors fear the virus will mutate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2026click on the above link to read the rest of the article\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u2018We\u2019re going to have more deaths\u2019: Influenza kills more people than the coronavirus so everyone is overreacting, right? Wrong \u2014 and here\u2019s why President Trump tweeted Monday that thousands die of the flu every year, and suggested that life should go on as usual \u2014 not so fast, experts say Coronavirus. It\u2019s just like the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[28817,29011,11955,5220,29190,7258],"class_list":["post-51692","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-environment","tag-coronavirus","tag-covid-19","tag-influenza","tag-marketwatch","tag-quentin-fottrell","tag-viral-outbreak"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51692","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=51692"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51692\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":51693,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51692\/revisions\/51693"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=51692"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=51692"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=51692"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}