https://twitter.com/BallouxFrancois/status/1470272474474496002
- BallouxFrancois
This graph takes a bit of explaining. First, cases (gray) are posted on the date they're collected. The deaths (red) are time-shifted back to adjust for the delay. That means we can only see to about the end of November.
Second, it's a log scale to show the trends. Each horizontal line is a 10x increase. If the red curve was one line lower than the case curve, that would be 10% case fatality rate. 2 lines would be 1% CFR. If looks like South Africa has been running a pretty typical rate near 2%.
But look where the cases spike up starting mid November. There hasn't been any significant increase in the death rate, and that should be visible by now. Further, reports from the hospitals suggest that the current patients are not as severe as previous waves, so the death curve is unlikely to move much in the next week.
This isn't conclusive, but all the data points and anecdotes I'm seeing are showing the same thing...huge increase in cases, modest increase in hospitalizations but reduced severity, and little or no death increase so far.
Give it another week to 10 days and I'd call it conclusive. For now, it's very promising. But remember, we still have a Delta wave in the US this season, and Delta will likely be killing over 2,000/day in the US by year end. Even if Omicron had 0% hospitalizations, this is still a fairly dangerous time if you're not boosted.