Day: 13 July 2020

Young People Over-Estimate Covid Risk A new working paper published in the National Bureau of Economic Research contains a shocking table (see above). The results are based on an online survey of over 1,500 Americans from May 6th – 13th. The respondents in the 18-34 year-old age group thought their risk of contracting COVID-19 was about 8.8% and if they caught it their risk of being hospitalised around 7.5% and their risk of dying 2%. If those figures were true, that would mean that 0.176% of 18-34 year-olds would die from coronavirus. There are 76.2 million Americans aged 18-34, so if the respondents' estimate of the risk was correct that would mean 134,112 people in that age group will die. Needless to say, the real risk posed to 18-34 year-olds is far lower. The Stanford Professor John Ioannidis co-authored a paper in May entitled "Population-level COVID-19 mortality risk for non-elderly individuals overall and for non-elderly individuals without underlying diseases in pandemic epicenters". It includes the following table showing the total number of under-40 year-olds who'd died from the virus in various countries: *Data shown for the group with age <45 years (not available for age <40 years) **Data shown for the group with age <35 years (not available for age <40 years) Admittedly, this was up to date on April ...