I knew it.
I knew it. The media is quoting the 50K+ number from the CDC for pneumonia deaths without any clarification or insight.
You can look in those same sources and find that there's an incidence of 1,291 cases per 100,000 population over age 65, with 196 deaths per 100,000 over age 65. Of course, this is specifically for Streptococcal pneumonia, presumably culture confirmed if they can say what bacterium it is*, and the overall mortality rate from invasive pneumococcal disease, which is a specific thing, is 10% across all age groups. They have rates, too, but I think they are age-adjusted and those calculations always confuse me. The numbers sound better, though (37.0 incidence, 5.61 deaths).
The point is, you can do responsible reporting with any of these, and probably other, numbers, but what the public, who doesn't know anything except the number you just quoted at them, hears and what they take from it is very different if you say "50,000" versus "5".
*The reports with the 50K mortality numbers are based on ICD-10 coding, as far as I can tell without any culture confirmation. This is an important difference as far as a professional would be concerned, although, again, the public in general will neither know the difference nor care.
You can look in those same sources and find that there's an incidence of 1,291 cases per 100,000 population over age 65, with 196 deaths per 100,000 over age 65. Of course, this is specifically for Streptococcal pneumonia, presumably culture confirmed if they can say what bacterium it is*, and the overall mortality rate from invasive pneumococcal disease, which is a specific thing, is 10% across all age groups. They have rates, too, but I think they are age-adjusted and those calculations always confuse me. The numbers sound better, though (37.0 incidence, 5.61 deaths).
The point is, you can do responsible reporting with any of these, and probably other, numbers, but what the public, who doesn't know anything except the number you just quoted at them, hears and what they take from it is very different if you say "50,000" versus "5".
*The reports with the 50K mortality numbers are based on ICD-10 coding, as far as I can tell without any culture confirmation. This is an important difference as far as a professional would be concerned, although, again, the public in general will neither know the difference nor care.
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