What’s the difference? Covid-19 vs. the seasonal flu

Photo by Ani Kolleshi on Unsplash

As the coronavirus spread in China, health experts tried to calm fears by saying it was like the flu. But then numbers multiplied quickly and the death rate started to soar.

The symptoms are similar: Fever, body ache, cough.

In fact, people with those symptoms are first tested for the flu, according to Lt. Governor of Hawaii Josh Green, who is also an emergency room doctor.

“They could test positive for the flu and then we’re in the clear,” he said.

“But if they test negative for the flu and they’re feeling that, everyone is asking themselves internally, doctors and patients alike, ‘do I have COVID-19?’”

SYMPTOMS OF CORONAVIRUS:

― Fever

― Breathing difficulties

Globally, a startling 45 million people have been diagnosed with influenza since October and 46,000 of those have died.

Compare that with COVID-19: There are at least 93,000 infected, according to the World Health Organization, and at least 3,199 have died.

While the flu infects far more ― and kills more ― the death rate is less than 1%. The death rate from COVID-19 is currently listed as 3.4%, according to the WHO.

Green does think that percentage will go down as more people are tested, diagnosed and then recover.

“I think ultimately it’s going to be something like one out of 200 people that die of the coronavirus,” Green said, “That’s still 7.5 times more fatal than the flu.”

And COVID-19 does discriminate. The older the patient, the higher the chance of death.

Those 80 years old have almost a 15% chance of dying. Those under 40 years old have only a 0.2 % chance of death. And no babies have died from the coronavirus.

The flu, on the other hand, has already killed more than 100 kids in the United States.

What makes COVID-19 so much scarier than the flu is a lack of understanding. It only surfaced less than three months ago. There is no vaccine and no treatment so far.