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The Math of Covid

We have an update on this on February 15, 2022 CLICK HERE.

There’s been so much debate about vaccines and effectiveness given that Covid 19 continues to plague us.  So we thought a simple mathematical analysis was in order.  As of 12/18/2021, since the start of the pandemic, there have been 50,479,372 cases with 800,939 deaths – a death rate of 1.59%.   The population of the United States is 329,500,00 so the overall percentage of the population lost to Covid to date has been .243 percent.    To put this in perspective, in any given year, the death rate in the U.S. is 8.9 per 1,000 people, .89 percent.  That improved from 9.5 about 30 years earlier. In 2020, the death rate was up 18%, presumably due to Covid.  Our birth rate is 12 per 1000 people.  So our population  is growing by .4% per year because we have that many more people being born than are dying.

Vaccines in the Equation

So what does all this have to do with vaccines?  At the beginning of the pandemic, we didn’t have vaccines, so we had limited means to slow the spread of Covid 19.  With vaccines being up to 95% effective (some less and all waning in effectiveness over time) we did come up with a way to battle Covid in a meaningful way.  What we did not count on was the higher than expected resistance among some Americans in getting the vaccine.     Therefore, as about 98% of unvaccinated people stay alive to spread the virus with many not knowing they even have it, eventually a number of vaccinated people are affected and get Covid.  Some of those individuals will die, especially at-risk and older Americans. 

Risk of Virus Tens of thousands of times that of vaccines

It’s strictly a numbers game.  The great number of people vaccinated, the lower number of people who will spread any disease.   And while there are some risks with any vaccine, the numbers are usually in the range of one death per million, so far less than the 15,000 per million who have died from Covid 19.

Actions You Can Take

What you can do:   If you haven’t already, seriously consider getting the vaccine to cut down on  your overall risk and also to protect your most at risk and perhaps older friends, family, and community.   When you go out in public in an indoor setting, consider wearing a mask to protect others from the Covid 19 you might be  unknowingly spreading as many cases among younger people have gone  unnoticed due to lack of symptoms.    It really does come down to simple math.