Originally Posted by AndyF
In Oregon where I live the mortality rate is pretty low, roughly 2 or 3 people per day out of 4 million population. Nobody knows what the infection rate is since they are only testing about 15,000 people per week. They are only testing a small group of people, namely those who think they are sick or people who have been in contact with sick people. Even with that narrow slice of the population they are only finding 3% infection rate. So only 3% of the people who think they are sick actually are infected with covid. Of the small group who are sick about 4% of them end up dying. So 4% of 3% which is a small number.

Currently in a population of 4 million we only have 57 people in the hospital with covid. The hospitals are almost vacant waiting for a rush of covid patients but only a trickle showed up. Which I suppose is a good thing but then again, there are a bunch of people who need medical care who aren't getting it. Some of those people are dying since they aren't being allowed to get the medical care they need.

In Oregon the last numbers I saw showed that almost everyone who has died of covid had an underlying medical condition. I think it was higher than 90%. And most of those people who died in our state were older than 80. So for the most part, covid is finishing off older people who were already sick. The policy makers have a tough problem on their hands but eventually they'll have to come up with a solution that gets the economy running even though sick people, and especially sick people who are older are continuing to die from the virus. They really have no other choice at this point. Shutting everything down is not a long term strategy since everyone will starve to death. Some of the politicians can't figure it out yet but they'll be forced to figure it out within the next few weeks.

At this point I think the virus is winning. It is going to kill off the older and sicker people over time. They might be able to stay isolated for a few months but eventually the virus will capture all of its victims. Only thing that is going to stop it is a cure and it could take a long time for that to appear. The politicians are going to need to move to the next stage of recovery sooner or later. Right now about half of them are refusing to accept reality.

I check Oregons info regularly as I have family and friends who live there. Some of what you've presented does not jive.
Oregon Data <- Click
One stand out is >80 = <1/2
At some-point down the road I expect our elected representives will provide us with the actual data. We should be able to see trends beginning and if the Federal Government established standardized reporting all states would (should) report similar %'s as we a dealing with a singal disease. The Specialists would be able to quickly pick up and variations they do not expect from a standardized reporting. i.e. - why a state is seeing an spike is a certain age group.