Wuhan, the Chinese city identified as the epicenter of the novel coronavirus, may have a lower death rate than what was previously reported. This is according to a study published recently in the journal Natural Medicine.
The study identified that Wuhan only has 1.4% of the death rate compared to a 2% to 3.4% death rate that was previously reported. The calculation was made using February 29 data where Wuhan had 48,557 COVID-19 cases and 2,169 deaths.
The study also highlighted what health experts have been saying about higher contraction and death rates among elderly COVID-19 patients. For all other ages who exhibited COVID-19 symptoms, the fatality rate was only 1.4%. By comparison, the death rate among people who are 60 years old and above was 2.6%.
The instance of showing COVID-19 symptoms are also higher as people age. The risk of developing symptomatic infection increases by 4% per year for people aged 30 to 60, according to the study.
The study forecasted that elderly, or those 60 years old and above, were twice as likely to develop symptoms compared to individuals aged 30 to 59. People below 30 years old, meanwhile, only have about one-sixth the chance to manifest symptoms.
The finding is significant in highlighting the possibility that many younger adults are asymptomatic and are spreading the infection unknowingly. At the same time, the finding also affirms the earlier conclusion that older people are at higher risk of dying due to the virus. Indeed, when translated to numbers, the study showed that people aged between 30 to 59 years old are 0.5% of dying after contracting the virus, while it's 0.3% for those under 30 years old.
In the end, the study warned that the transmission of COVID-19 is difficult to control.
"We might expect at least half of the population to be infected, even with aggressive use of community mitigation measures," the study warns.
Indeed, COVID-19 is killing people all over the world at a rate that wasn't expected. Of most particular concern right now is Iran where one report said one person is dying every 10 minutes. 18,500 people have already contracted the virus and at least 1,284 people already died. Iran has the highest death toll outside of China and next to Italy.
Iran has, in fact, saw a spike in deaths in the past 24 hours, 149 to be exact. The World Health Organization said the reported numbers from Iran may actually be higher since testing is only done for most severe cases.
Italy, meanwhile, has surpassed China's death toll as of March 19. The country saw 3,405 total deaths as of Thursday. That is 156 more than China's deaths at 3,249. At the same time, Italy's confirmed cases are now at 41,035, with 5,322 new cases reported in the past 24 hours.
