Panic! Panic! >cue dramatic music< The Delta variant is here! COVID-19 cases are spiking again! We’re all going to die!

… oh, wait, no, we’re not, contrary to the strong impression created by irresponsible “news” outlets. The survival rate for COVID-19 continues as sky high as it was from the beginning. Nor are hospitals being overwhelmed. Credit to Rhode Island Governor Dan McKee, by the way, for citing that on Tuesday as one of the bases for the state not reinstituting a mask mandate or restrictions.

Now, let’s look at the actual survival rate. The CDC estimates that, through the end of May, there have been 120,200,000 total COVID-19 infections in the United States. On that same link, the CDC estimates COVID-19 deaths at 767,000.

Let’s stop here to note something about these numbers that was frankly an eye-opener for me. That CDC estimate of 120,200,000 COVID-19 cases in the United States far exceeds the more commonly reported number of roughly 35,500,000 because, as the CDC notes, it adjusts

… for cases that national surveillance networks do not capture for a number of reasons.

Fascinating. Note that, similarly, their estimate of 767,000 COVID-19 deaths is higher than the commonly reported figure of approximately 622,000.

So, a couple of quick and easy calculations.

767,000 / 120,200,000 = .00638 case fatality rate.

Accordingly, per the CDC, the overall COVID-19 survival rate in the United States across all ages is 99.362%.

Remarkably high. One that, from the beginning, threw into question draconian “mitigation” measures that have inflicted heavy collateral damage. But it is an important datapoint you have to do a little research to learn. You almost certainly won’t get from the mainstream media, much of which is hellbent on making “COVID case” synonymous with “COVID death” with blaring headlines like “COVID Cases Hit New High …”, “Global COVID Cases Surpass XX Million …” while scrupulously avoiding any mention that tens of millions of people (119,000,000 actually) in the US alone have survived the disease, presumably to boost clicks and readership. ‘Cause nothing sells like hitting the fear instinct, even if you have to lie … er, hype and hyper focus on one narrow data point to try to gin up that panic.

Featured image by Marcelo Vaz on Unsplash.