So far, the new coronavirus, dubbed 2019-nCoV, has led to more than 20,000 illnesses and 427 deaths in China, as well as more than 200 illnesses and two deaths outside of mainland China. But that’s nothing compared with the flu, also called influenza. In the U.S. alone, the flu has already caused an estimated 19 million illnesses, 180,000 hospitalizations and 10,000 deaths this season, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). [...]
“Despite the morbidity and mortality with influenza, there’s a certainty … of seasonal flu," Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said in a White House press conference on Jan. 31. “I can tell you all, guaranteed, that as we get into March and April, the flu cases are going to go down. You could predict pretty accurately what the range of the mortality is and the hospitalizations [will be],” Fauci said. “The issue now with [2019-nCoV] is that there’s a lot of unknowns.” [...]
The death rate for 2019-nCoV is still unclear, but it appears to be higher than that of the flu. Throughout the outbreak, the death rate for 2019-nCoV has been about 2%. Still, officials note that in the beginning of an outbreak, the initial cases that are identified “skew to the severe,” which may make the mortality rate seem higher than it is, Alex Azar, U.S. secretary of the Health and Human Services, said during a news briefing on Jan. 28. The mortality rate may drop as more mild cases are identified, Azar said.
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