Originally Posted by
Australopithecus
On today’s data we are back to an additional 4000 cases. If yesterday’s spike is factored in, the additional case numbers average out to around 4000/day for the last ten days or so. Which is itself an oversimplification. Why would the case numbers grow linearly?
Apologies if this is repetitive, but I didn't see it addressed here, so . . .
It appears that the big jump in reported cases in China is a result of a change in the diagnostic protocol. As we know, they have been hopelessly backlogged trying to verify diagnoses with RT-PCR tests (the only way to do so accurately and quickly). So, now, they are simply judging (assuming, really) that patients showing signs of pneumonia on chest scans are coronavirus cases. Most probably are (there, at this time) and treatment is the same whatever virus may be causing the illness, so it makes good clinical sense to do this. That said, it makes the diagnoses rather less certain and created this big jump, since all those patients who had been through radiology but not been verified by PCR are suddenly "confirmed" cases.