Foreword
Hey hey people, (the) Mikky here, back to my usual naughtiness. This time it should be a relatively short post, where I try to make a relatively simple point - that absolute risk of covid is not that great for the individual.
I'm far behind the narrative, to be honest - we're no longer "endangering ourselves", we're now a threat to society. As with most baseless accusations, it is impossible to disprove because the accusation is the assumption.
Anyway, let's do some risk/benefit analyses. As always, welcome to skip to the conclusions if you're short on time or patience to deal with my bullshit.
Definition: Absolute risk vs Relative risk
We've heard all about the 95% (alleged) vaccine efficacy. No doubt an impressive number. However, one should also take into account the initial risk before vaccination. For example, ebola supposedly has a 25–90% mortality (wiki). A 95% effective vaccine would reduce this to 1.25-4.5%. Good stuff!
However, I'm not rushing to get an ebola vaccine, despite really, really, really not wanting to get infected. Why this contradictory and illogical decision?
Simple - the absolute risk of me catching ebola in the first place, is close to nill (at least, where I live). Whenever you calculate risk/benefit you should also take into account what the absolute risk is.
Should you insure your house against earthquakes? If you live in Japan, sure. Not really worth it if you live in most of Africa, Canada, Europe, Россия, Brazil, etc... you get the point.
So when you read the amazing protection that the vaccine gives, keep in mind what your absolute risk currently is. If you watch the news, you'd think the WuFlu's right around the corner and if you haven't caught it yet, you're one of the luckiest bastards alive.
Meet the data
In its raw form, it's time-series data.
In this graph, we see the number of positive cases a day, normalized per population sizes. Now, I don't care about any particular time period - I'm going to sum it all up, and as the data is normalized, this will get me the total risk of infection over the time period. Which by the way, is from 17 January 2021 to now (2 December 2021). Cool.
The data is also divided into 2 basic age categories - those above 60, those below 60, and the general population (all normalized to their respective population sizes).
Caveats
- Like I said, data starts from Jan 2021. I am missing half of the 3rd wave and the entirety of the 1st and 2nd waves.
- Age groups are ridiculously loose
0-60 are placed under the same category. Because Israel has a metric fuckton of kids, this means that the numbers are HEAVILY skewed for their population. However, they are also the majority of our covid cases, so maybe it balances out. Still, important to keep this in mind. - This is Israeli data only.
I cannot speak for covid in your area, or how the risk analysis changes by your location. However, considering that we're testing up the ass, I highly doubt there's a significant # of missed cases (if anything, there's less than reported but that's another post) - No mention of treatment (or lack thereof)
A no-brainer, but simply data I don't have. So I'm going to assume that all the severe cases got hospital care. Make of that what you wish...
OK, that seems to be the brunt of it. Let's see some risks!
The total risk graph for (most of) 2021
What's my risk of catching covid throughout 2021
Reminder that there were 2 heavy waves that hit us. So what's the chance if you picked someone at random and they got covid?
About 13% in the general or under 60 population. That's quite a bit, but I should also add that an overwhelming amount of our cases were kids:
- Note that here % are of total cases reported, NOT % of the population.
OK, that's enough to claim that it's a pandemic... well, as far as positive cases are concerned.
But we don't care about becoming a positive case.
What's my risk of getting a serious case of covid?
Here is where most analyses show you the risk of deteriorating into serious illness once you catch the bug. Here it is, I won't go in-depth here. I think that the fact that you can barely see the under 60 numbers tells everything you need to know.
- I should note that for the elderly (>60), the risk is significantly higher. Do your own due diligence on the matter.
Now for what I really wanted: absolute risk of serious covid, taking into account that you may not get the damn thing!
Yes, great job on the vaccinated for lowering their risk significantly (blue bar is far lower than the green bar).
However, if you're under 60 - your risk of getting serious covid throughout 2021 was ... squints eyes ... 0.1%? Remember that this includes 40, 50 + year olds. As a 28 year old guy my number would be even smaller. To reduce a 0.1% risk to say, 0.01%... eh. I'm not rushing to the vax clinic.
What's my risk of dying of covid ?
Death, though definite, is hardly a good definition of severity. None of us want to survive and be left with life-long injuries, or even suffer immensely as our bodies rot and hurt in front of our eyes. Nevertheless, it is the ultimate price to pay, and the question is - how high is this risk?
According to these data, we lost almost 1% of unvaccinated elderly throughout 2021. Nothing to be happy about, but it is also the only significant number to pull here, I feel. I can't even see the risk of dying of covid if you're under 60.
Conclusions
If covid keeps up at this pace, it's very likely we will all catch it sooner or later - at an approximate yearly rate of ~13% of the unvaccinated population and ~3% for the fully vaccinated. That is, if herd immunity doesn't whoop it before that.
However, your risk of getting severely ill from covid? Minuscule. If 2021 is a good benchmark, I run a yearly risk of ~0.1% for serious illness as an unvaccinated under 60 year old. This means that say, over 20 years my risk of getting serious illness from covid will be ~2%. That's more than enough time for me to see the effects of the vaccine and decide as I enter my 50s whether it's the right decision for me.
This is not to encourage people to be reckless, or discourage people from vaccination if they feel that their personal risk is higher.
This is to point out that statistically speaking, you're very, very likely to be fine (at least, under-60s). My advice would be to try any number of treatment and prophylactic options if you're worried. Personal disclosure: I take 1000 IU of Vitamin D every day, and have Hydroxychloroquine and Ivermectin at hand if needed.
Bonus graph - per-age risk distribution
Since I already know you hit that 100%, I'll be extra nice:
Here's the risk of getting severe covid, assuming you got it already by age and sex. I don't recommend comparing it to the previous graph because I simply divided the total # of serious cases since the start of corona by the total # of cases (per age/sex group).
Oddly enough, my age group (20-29 males) gets 0.2% risk all of a sudden - and that's assuming you caught the virus! I can't tell where the discrepancy between the two data lie, especially since the comparison is unfair (0-60 vs 20-29... who knows how much that skews the #?)
Anyway, stay safe, stay great, you're all truly wonderful.
Source
https://datadashboard.health.gov.il/COVID-19/
Positive cases, severe cases, and deaths normalized per 100k (all covid)