As in be infected themselves or have someone they directly know infected, until the crisis is globally acknowledged to be at least stable. I ask about both Americans and worldwide.
I was wondering about this because the scale feels like it’d touch practically everyone, but that doesn’t feel right at the same time. This would have an impact on political and preparedness implications, so it seems relevant, considering how much we see that it takes being affected to get some people to care (and even then it’s not a guarantee).
If I understand what you are asking, I’ve heard that as many as 40% of people who have COVID are completely asymptomatic. Maybe it’s even higher, though that’s scary enough, considering that they have no symptoms but are still able to spread the disease.
Pretty sure the answer is going to vary pretty widely by region. My metro area of ~1M people had slightly more than 2000 confirmed cases and I didn’t know any of them.
That is a good point; just because someone is infected doesn’t mean they know it. I’d include them in the “not directly touched” column unless and until they actually feel symptoms.
And in my rural podunk county with a population of ~100K, there are 40 confirmed cases. I personally know one of them, and indeed spent several hours in her office for a couple of days just as her symptoms began (this was before we went into quarantine and nobody really believed it was as bad as it really was. She chalked it up to the flu until she went to her doc who diagnosed it as C19.)
I dunno. If I had a positive diagnosis and had to be in a true quarrentine for weeks, I’d consider that “touched”.
I feel like most people I know, know someone who has died or gotten very ill. A guy died that I knew casually: taught his kids, worked with his wife. We made small talk a few times. My dad lost two people he went to high school with that he and my mom were still friendly with. Is that “touched”?
By years end, I think there will be very few people that don’t know anyone who was very sick or died.
I know people who have never exhibited a symptom, nor had any kind of positive test, yet they’ve lost their business and are floundering economically. Were they touched?
Not the way I interpret the topic. If you or a loved one gets the disease, you’re bound to take it more seriously. A person who loses money/their business is just as likely to think it was overhyped.
Ok, but that wouldn’t be my reaction. I know COVID is dangerous. But if I actually had it, and had to spend two weeks locked down, terrified it might become symptomatic or my loved ones might have gotten it from me, I’d be pretty pissed if you told me “COVID didn’t affect your life, not really”.
If you lost two weeks wages, all the while terrified of horrible symptoms that never come, not many people would think “omg, we should take this disease more seriously!”. Most would probably think “that was it? Wtf?”
We were discussing this at home yesterday. In my UK County, there have been relatively few infections and neither we, nor anyone we know, knows anyone who has been infected.
We wen’t on to talk about the commonly applied (trope?) that "every family suffered a loss in the two World Wars. To the best of our knowledge, neither my family, nor my wife’s lost anyone in either conflict, although several relatives were involved.
I think that, over time, the people who never get it will be in the minority.
The key is to try to get it later when the treatment regimens have been figured out and are much better at reducing the worst of its effects. That’s why things like social distancing and mask wearing are important. Chances are, most of us reading this thread will eventually get it. It’s when you get it that matters.
For most of us, that doesn’t matter either. It’s becoming clear that the solid majority don’t even get symptoms and the majority of those that do, symptoms are minor. For people at risk, yes probably the later the better.
You might have a point: the majority of people don’t show serious symptoms.
But if you live in Metro Phoenix, where they’re reporting 1,300 cases in a single day, hospitals quickly run out of space. That’s a problem for anyone who gets sick, whether it’s with COVID or being in a car accident.
I know two people who have died from it. I know one person who is currently hospitalized with it, and I expect that he will die. A friend lives at a retirement home where two people have tested positive.
But, besides this, I postponed my mammogram from March, because the facility wasn’t scheduling any non-essential tests when CV first hit. When I finally had the mammo in June, it showed some atypical cells, and I needed a biopsy. So I was affected by policy.
If you had to reschedule, cancel, or change some activity or appointment, then you have been directly touched by COVID. Concert, sports event, school event, funeral or wedding, family reunion, vacation-- did you change or cancel? Are you attending religious services, work meetings, book club by zoom? Then you have been directly affected. Even if you don’t know anybody personally who has CV or has had it.
And by my calculations, that’s just about everyone. (NOT everyone, so don’t claim I said that, but “just about” everyone. No specific percentage named, for obvious reasons.)
Though as pointed out earlier, being touched “only” “by policy” can easily have the opposite effect when we’re considering how this will affect voting and compliance. That was what I thinking about: how many Americans will never know someone who is ill directly, and thus might never take this seriously, and reflect that in whatever polls you can think of?