For most people, the coronavirus era has been a depressing period, filled with bad news and even personal tragedy. But even now, amid reports of a rising number of new coronavirus cases, there has been some good news. Specifically, the virus is becoming a lot less deadly as time goes on.
Two new studies confirm this fact. One, conducted at New York University between March and August of this year, shows that even among hospitalized patients, the very worst cases, the COVID-19 mortality rate since the beginning of the pandemic has plummeted from 25.6% to 7.6%. Even better, the drop in mortality is shared across all age groups. This serves to demonstrate that the fall in mortality is not merely a function of the virus spreading to a larger population of younger and healthier people. Rather, it is a benefit to everyone who contracts a serious case with heavy enough symptoms and complications to reach the hospital.
A 7.6% death rate for hospitalized cases is still high, without question. However, this represents enormous progress — a 70% drop in the fatality rate.
How did this happy development arise? First, the medical profession has a much better idea today of how to handle COVID-19 cases at all stages than it did in March. No one could have known how to treat this illness when it first emerged, and several decisions made at that time — for example, the initial urge to put people on ventilators — turned out to be bad ideas. Today, NPR explained this week, doctors have become better at recognizing the signs that a patient is taking a serious turn for the worse and at applying proven, standardized treatments depending on how patients present.
It is also likely that those facing greater risks from the virus — overwhelmingly, those who have died so far had other health risk factors in addition to the virus itself — have learned to be more careful and that everyone’s widespread practice of wearing masks is having the effect of reducing their daily risk of exposure.
This new development should change the calculus that public health officials use in moving forward. If indeed the nation is facing a new wave of infections this winter, as it appears, the appropriate reaction of October or November will probably not be the same one that seemed to make sense in March or April. The reimposition of government-mandated lockdowns could well be a major mistake now, especially given the depression, anxiety, joblessness, and excess morbidity that the lockdowns themselves have been causing people all year.
No matter who wins the election, and no matter how soon a vaccine is developed, the coronavirus likely isn’t going anywhere in the near term. Masks and social distancing will surely remain an important part of the fight to let people move about and conduct their affairs in as normal a way as possible. It is incumbent upon everyone to view these relatively mild restrictions as a way of avoiding the severe, draconian measures that some jurisdictions in the United States imposed reflexively.
The coronavirus remains a serious problem. But we must not lose sight of the tremendous progress that has been made.
