swine flu numbers

so, three swine flu cases in Oxnard, and half-dozen in a kids' camp near San Lois Obispo, it will be here by the weekend
but it is ok, according ot the LA Times it is going to be mild...

so, what do the numbers tell us so far

well, it would be nice to know wtf is going on in Mexico...

but, the US has 109 confirmed cases and it sounds like there are several hundred more suspected and to be confirmed soon - we're still on the apparent linear slow rise on the exponential, and of course we have no info on when it will saturate and flatten - rise and inflection will be interesting

the flu is not being overblown, even if mild - the problem is that there is almost certainly no immunity in the population.
So LOTS of people are likely to get it quickly.
I don't think the school closures and local containment measures will keep this in, though it may slow the spread in smaller communities.

Some of those will die.
Of suspected cases, it looks like ~ < 10% are being hospitalized, and this flu looks not atypical in that ~ 5% of severe cases (ie hospitalized patients) die.
Big question is how many asymptomatic or very mild cases are there for every mild case?
Could be 0, 1, 10 or 100...
be interesting to know the burn rate of antivirals for severe cases, and whether they are being used prophylactically for contacts of suspected cases
and what will happen when the antivirals run out

The danger is still a total of 100 million US cases, and billion or more worldwide, over a short time. Either now, or in a second wave next winter.
Which could still mean hundreds of thousand fatalities in the US and tens of millions worldwide.
Be touch-n-go whether a vaccine could be developed and manufactured in large enough quantities by winter.

Or not. It could still fizzle, though that is looking less likely;
or there could be 100 asymptomatic cases per severe case and it becomes a mild endemic strain - we won't know that for several weeks, if and when epidemiologists sample healthy people for antibodies showing they got it and fought it off.

Pandemic Severity Index

this will kick in when WHO declares stage 6 pandemic