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@cwebber has a thread on the current H5N1 situation, which is an interesting (and useful) read. There are mortality stats in it and I wanted to add some statistics color to that, since it's common for people to see these and panic. Don't panic! (actually never panic, it doesn't help)
Disease fatality/injury rates are, especially for very rare occurrence diseases, extremely biased because the sample the draw from is biased. The real rates are almost always lower.
https://social.coop/@cwebber/113680455871797535
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The main reason the real rates for these rare-infection diseases is lower is because we're only analyzing the stats on the people we actually know got the disease, and for these rare diseases that means people who either died (so the local authorities checked), or got sick enough to go see a doctor *and* got their infection analyzed. If you just felt meh, or didn't present symptoms, or your doctor waved you off, then you won't be in the stats.
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@wordshaper These are great points!
@cwebber I thought it was important to make 'em but I couldn't think of a way to phrase it as a reply that didn't either co-opt the thread or "well, actually"''d it, neither of which is cool. That thread is useful and derailing wouldn't help!
I stats for a (partial) living, though, and I know how folks tend to misunderstand them. (Which is fine, stats are weird, and frankly if you think about them and your head *doesn't* hurt you're probably missing something. Maybe that's just me, though...:)
@wordshaper naw I love it, thank you! and the way you did it is great <3