Youtubes are never good sources.
I already brought this up. Turns out that India has the lowest rate of testing.
This article goes over the possible reasons:
There are four possible explanations:
*The epidemic may have struck later than in other countries. Since epidemics have exponential growth at the start, a small delay can have massive effects on the number of cases.
India’s 21-day lockdown may have successfully suppressed the epidemic. Physical distancing is one of the best ways to slow the epidemic and, if anything, many have criticized the lockdown for being too draconian in that regard.
India has not been able to test enough to count all cases and deaths. Without sufficient testing, many deaths may not be labeled with Covid-19 for official statistics, leading to an underestimation of the severity of the crisis.
India may have protective characteristics against Covid-19. Researchers have proposed that the low share of elderly in the population, the high temperatures and humidity in India, widespread BCG vaccination for tuberculosis, or resistance to malaria have helped India escape the brunt of the pandemic.
First, we can rule out that India is in an early stage of the pandemic. The first infected travelers from Wuhan reached Kerala, southwest India, on January 29. While it is true that Kerala acted quickly and contained a potential outbreak, more carriers reached other states by early March.
While the lockdown will certainly have an effect on the pandemic in India in the long run, there has not been enough time for its impact to be felt. So the current low level of deaths is really telling us about what happened before the lockdown began. Moreover, it is unclear that the lockdown has been total. Besides videos of migrants crowding the Delhi/Uttar Pradesh border or Bandra station in Mumbai waiting to go home and the news of the Tablighi Jamaat Markaz event in New Delhi (which led to a spike in cases), there is also Google Mobility data that backs this thesis. In addition, if India’s caseload is low because of the lockdown, it will not help when the lockdown ends.
India, like many countries, has been unable to procure enough tests. The lack of surveillance means that many deaths due to Covid-19 may not have been classified as such. A Covid-19 death typically is confirmed by a Covid RT-PCR test. Those tests are in short supply and cost INR 4500 ($60) in India. Moreover, if an individual with Covid-like symptoms dies, but a test is not performed before his death, it does not make sense to waste scarce resources on the cadaver. Nor do officials report unconfirmed, Covid-like deaths, because there are many reasons that one may die from flu-like symptoms, and officials do not want to create panic…
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Ultimately, India’s relatively light exposure to Covid-19 remains a puzzle. It may have certain characteristics that protect it from the deadliest impact, but they do not suggest that it will escape the pandemic unscathed. Great care and vigilance are still necessary.
*
In the last several days, Russia has moved into the steep part of the exponential curve, at least as far as new cases go. So they aren’t a good example of a country that’s done things right.
Singapore’s also moved into the steep part of the curve after being called a role model for many months. It just goes to show that a single mistake in your containment can be all that seperates life as normal from things spiralling out of control. That’s why I think it makes more sense to focus on measures than numbers.
There’s an absolutely horrifying cluster developing in Harbin right now:
Translation & Summary:
- On March 19th, a “Ms Han” arrived in Harbin, China from the US.
- She was personally escorted home and completed a 14 day home isolation and was allowed out after 2 consecutive negative tests on April 3rd.
- On April 9th, a confirmed case of a “Mr Guo” was reported in Harbin and was contact traced to his girlfriend Ms Cao.
- Ms Cao lived with her mother and mother’s boyfriend in Apartment 302, Ms Han lives in Apartment 402.
- On April 10th and 11th, “Ms Han” was again tested and found positive.
- The Cao household was tested and confirmed positive for anti-bodies but negative for PCR and all 3 them never exhibited any symptoms.
- It’s currently unclear what the transmission route between “Ms Han” and the Cao household is. The two houses share a common elevator which is under suspicion as the transmission path although more research is ongoing.
- Mr Guo then subsequently spread it to at least 13 people and contact tracing is still ongoing.
I was previously quite bullish on the suppression strategy although data from China is showing just how insanely vigilant you would need to be to make suppression work. Harbin is now switching to 14 day centralized quarantine and then another 14 day home quarantine after this news.
Hat tip to Chenchen Zhang who is doing some truly excellent reporting of interesting news out of China that isn’t making the Western internet.
False article, India has most sufficient testing anywhere in the world. We are getting 3-4 percent positives even in highly suspicious persons…compare this with 25% positives in Europe
Texas (hot) : population 3cr. (30 million) Deaths 404
New York(cold) : population 2cr. Deaths 17000
Fatality numbers are to do with temperatures… hotter areas,less deaths…cold area , more deaths unfortunately. As simple as that. Europe, Iran, wuhan, newyork etc. all hotbeds are cold.
Nope:
India 248 test per million people. 8th worst.
Japan 843
UK 5057
US 10,453
Germany- 20,786
The crucial metric is # of tests performed vs # of cases found. Taiwan, for example, has done 1/5th the number of tests per capita as the US for the simple reason that if you don’t have anyone to test, then you have no need to test. Would you rather be in Taiwan or the USA right now?
By this metric, India is performing 22 tests for every positive case vs America’s 5 (and Taiwan’s 130, Vietnam’s 770 and Russia’s 54). Really what matters more is how this metric changes day by day but I don’t have access to that data.
Not so sure about that. Using that as a metric is contingent upon equal access to testing and care. The more wealth inequality and the more that wealth inequality impacts health care access, the less reliable that metric is. Wealth inequality in India is dramatic. Even more than in the United States, and in the United States we saw it: if you are in that elite group, be it by celebrity or wealth, you will get a test well just because; not and well good luck. Hard to not imagine that such is even more the case in the even more extreme inequality circumstance of India. The wealthiest are not living in the most crowded multigenerational household conditions but if they are concerned by the slight sore throat and sniffle they have do you really think that they will be unable to get tested? Do you really think that the person living in the crowded slums of Mumbai is as going to get a test as easily? Or do they just seal Dharavi off as a “containment zone” and not bother to test there so much? If you are lill and live in Dharavi do you willingly go to a fever clinic to get tested from which you may be sent to a camp with those infected or suspected of being infected? Or alternatively cause your building to be completely sealed off (not sure how that works when toilets are communally shared outside)?
I mean, the concept applies at every level of resolution. If you have access to more fine grained info and can show there are regions/demographics/periods of time of India where the positive ratio is 10:1 or lower, then India should be worried.
Empirically, it seems like you need to get testing rates above 100:1 to be sure that you have the epidemic contained. If you’re at 10:1, then you’re guaranteed to have significant community spread you’re not aware of. If you’re somewhere like 3:1 which is what Italy was during its worst days, then you’re in real trouble.