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Since it became known about the new coronavirus, it is often compared with the flu. This coronavirus infection is not such a terrible disease – it’s no worse than ordinary flu, it dies more every year from it. 59.Ru checked whether this is so and talked with doctors about whether it is possible to compare these two diseases at all.
Rosstat every year publishes a summary of how many people died and what caused their death. If you look at these data, you can find that in 2019, 492 people died from acute respiratory viral infections and influenza, 486 died in 2018 (225 of them from the flu).
Today, April 26, the coronavirus control center reports about 747 deaths in Russia from a new infection. This despite the fact that from the moment of the first death in the country, less than one and a half months have passed.
But even mortality, according to doctors, is not the worst in the coronavirus.
– The new coronavirus is more dangerous than the influenza virus not in terms of mortality, but in epidemiological danger, as it is prone to a low-symptom or completely asymptomatic course and has a long incubation period, – says therapist Ivan Skorokhodov. – Speaking of mortality from these infections and their assessment, it must be said that any pneumonia is dangerous for people with concomitant pathology of the cardiovascular and / or respiratory system. As a rule, such diseases are very characteristic of the elderly and old. In people with such diseases, pneumonia often causes complications that can lead to failure of organs and systems and further death of a person. If we compare the flu and coronavirus in terms of mortality, then everything is not so simple – COVID-19 (if we only talk about it, and not about other coronaviruses) is one, and the strains of the influenza virus differ from each other, including mortality. For example, during the epidemic of the so-called swine flu, mortality was higher than in other years.
– A comparison of coronavirus infection and infection with influenza virus is correct if we are talking about the clinical forms of the disease. Often, without special tests, it is impossible to figure out which virus has caused damage to the upper respiratory tract and lungs at the moment, there are no special clinical signs. But at the same time, both viruses can cause pneumonia, which is more dangerous, ”the doctor explains.
If you look at mortality from pneumonia in general, it will be much higher. So, for example, in 2018, 25,642 people died due to pneumonia in Russia. It is most dangerous for children: according to the WHO, every year 15 percent of children die because of pneumonia. But not only the virus can cause pneumonia. It can also be fungi and bacteria, for example the same staphylococcus. Namely, viral pneumonia for the whole of 2018 had 153 deaths.
“Pneumonia is just one of the manifestations of a new coronavirus infection,” said Oksana Drapkina, the chief freelance specialist in therapy and general medical practice. – It can manifest as ARVI, as pneumonia without respiratory failure, as pneumonia with respiratory failure, as acute respiratory distress syndrome. Now it is important for us to analyze in detail and identify any symptoms in the complex that clearly describe this particular disease.
Now scientists and doctors need time to figure out a new coronavirus infection, to find out all its symptoms, course and possible outcomes. And after that it will be possible to fully compare the unfamiliar disease with others.
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