https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/04/23/us/covid-19-death-toll.html

during the spanish flu were dying young and healthy, with covid it's elderly and ill.

5 hours ago, internationalism said:

during the spanish flu were dying young and healthy, with covid it's elderly and ill.

 

And your point is?

Average life expectancy also expected to drop by a little over one year.

 

Actually surprised it's not more (excess deaths) given the strains on the health-care systems, and other life-saving treatments (unrelated to COVID-19) may have been limited.

 

 

1 hour ago, mtls2005 said:

Average life expectancy also expected to drop by a little over one year.

 

Actually surprised it's not more (excess deaths) given the strains on the health-care systems, and other life-saving treatments (unrelated to COVID-19) may have been limited.

 

Hospital capacity is small relative to population, so it doesn't take that much to overwhelm it.  But it does take a lot to affect life expectancy.

But you also have 3x as many people. 103,208,000 in 1918 and 332,579,690 in 2021. I know we're talking about rates.

5 hours ago, GeorgeEboy said:

But you also have 3x as many people. 103,208,000 in 1918 and 332,579,690 in 2021. I know we're talking about rates.

 

So, if we are talking about rates, why does the size matter?  Is there any other conclusion, but that Covid has had a much bigger death toll than the 1918 Flu?

1 hour ago, cmarshall said:

 

So, if we are talking about rates, why does the size matter?  Is there any other conclusion, but that Covid has had a much bigger death toll than the 1918 Flu?

Is that surprising to you? Not at all to me and fully expected IMO.

America is a large country and had less than a third of the people in 1918, most of which probably lived in rural areas. Now people are crammed into cities, which are unhealthy at the best of times.

I'd be surprised if the rate wasn't higher.

 

Corona still has a way to go to surpass the Spanish flu which according to Wikipedia killed between 20 and 50 million, so covid has NOT had a much bigger death toll worldwide.

3 hours ago, cmarshall said:

 

So, if we are talking about rates, why does the size matter?  Is there any other conclusion, but that Covid has had a much bigger death toll than the 1918 Flu?

Rate per capita, it is smaller.

Rate per nation, it is larger.