Coronavirus Update (3/19/20)

There are now 10,725 cases and 160 deaths in the U.S.

It’s believed that the true total number of cases in the U.S. is five to ten times higher than reported due to non-symptomatic people and those unable to get tested, according to a study published in Science.

Here are direct quotes from the abstract:

Here we use observations of reported infection within China…We estimate 86% of all infections were undocumented…prior to 23 January 2020 travel restrictions. Per person, the transmission rate of undocumented infections was 55% of documented infections…yet, due to their greater numbers, undocumented infections were the infection source for 79% of documented cases. These findings explain the rapid geographic spread of SARS-CoV2 and indicate containment of this virus will be particularly challenging.

According to the study, the unreported cases may not be as contagious, but they are responsible for more than 3/4 of the known transmissions.