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#UScoronavirus deathsDear Readers:
I hate guns and loud noises. I do not want to see any person get hurt. The book The Great Influenza had a profound impact on me. Dr. Seth Shostak introduced me to the book and the author John Barry. This book has become my guide as to what is happening with this pandemic and what will happen next fall and winter.
My son is a scientist. I could not produce the rigorous statistical analysis that he would need to write a paper putting forth this projection. I could not produce a medical paper that would satisfy my wife and medical colleagues that such a death rate was possible.
I have learned the great value of common sense in almost 72 years on earth. 102 years ago the world had roughly 1.4 billion people. We now have some 7.5 billion people. The population has increased 5.36 times. The US had roughly 103,208,000 people in 1918. We now have roughly 330,000,000 people. Our population has increased 3.2 times. If we take the Spanish flu death rate of 675,000 and multiply it by 3.2 we get a result of 2,160,000 possible deaths.
Many of my readers including those with medical and scientific training will protest that such a projection is unrealistic. After all, we have far superior technology and medical capabilities now than we had 102 years ago. My doctor wife will point to many patients she knows who were saved now and would have died 102 years ago. This is a fair comment.
The technology also works against us. In 1918 passenger flights were unheard of. Today we have thousands of jet airliners carrying people all over the world. This rapid mobility allows faster spread. We also have a failure of political will in this country and in Brasil.
There is all this optimism about a vaccine being developed quickly. Everytime there is a new trial of a coronavirus vaccine, there is big media fanfare. Medical professionals who develop vaccines as their life work are much more pessimistic. They talk about a timeline of up to 4 years to have an effective vaccine ready. It might not take this long. It will not happen this year. There is also talk that the population will gain herd immunity. We have no proof this will happen with coronavirus.
If we follow the history presented in The Great Influenza, we can expect a very bad second wave next fall.
Balancing all these factors, I reduced the possible 2,160,000 death toll in the US down to 1,500,000 deaths. It is only an educated guess.
Before I leave you, let us talk for a second about possible world death tolls. The world population has increased 5.6 times from 1918 until now. John M. Barry went on the record with an estimated death toll of 100 million worldwide from the Spanish flu. Let your imagination go to work here and multiply 100 million by 5.6.

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