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Deaths

Large number of deaths not included in the official data to hide the Spanish lead worldwide in deaths and to manipulate the data for the regional distribution hiding the real data of some regions like Madrid

3479 death in 3rd age residences deceased with sympthoms compatible with coronavirus, not counted because have not been tested properly, only in the Comunidad de Madrid. 877 Castile and Leon. 143 in Navarre. 11 in Cantabria. 4510 total announced in Spain. The same concept for Catalonia or the Basque Country is 0, where all the deceased have been counted properly. https://www.europapress.es/madrid/noticia-comunidad-registra-4750-mayores-fallecidos-residencias-781-positivos-3479-sintomas-20200408132735.html — Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.151.33.251 (talk) 07:38, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

The tables include only confirmed cases per World Health Organization definition. Many countries, including Spain, have problems with testing, including post-morterm testing. But there is currently no way we kind fix this at the moment. --MarioGom (talk) 14:18, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
Appears to be the same in NY. These discussion could go in the articles about the regions. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:04, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
In the case of Spain is obviously a policy of the country to hide that Spain wouldhave now over 20000 deaths by coronavirus, and to make a regional distortion of the data against Catalonia and the Basque Country. This will be fixed by the country, but only when the US has up to the number of Spain after the correction. --unsigned
If the regions (countries, cities, etc.) published recent all-cause deaths data on a daily or weekly basis, we would not have this problem: a large increase of deaths (whatever they are attributed to, with whatever attribution error) would be visible in the all-cause death data. We have something like this in EuroMOMO for some European countries, and even better (IMHO) graphs for Switzerland[1]. EuroMOMO has Spain and it is up to week 14; the EuroMOMO Spain peak in week 14 is worse than the worst older peak there in years 2015-2020. The EuroMOMO graphs are all-cause graphs and do not suffer from attribution problems (whether over-attribution or under-attribution). --Dan Polansky (talk) 06:18, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

All-cause deaths in the U.S. are falling and are at a multi-year low

All-cause deaths in the U.S. are falling and are at a multi-year low. It follows from CDC[2], from the graph with blue bars. This is a key piece of information for an overview article on the covid pandemic. The graph could even be copied to Wikipedia since CDC is a state agency, from what I understand. --Dan Polansky (talk) 06:50, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Objection: We would need to make it clear that the most recent parts of the graph are possibly subject to incompleteness due to data delays. This CDC page, a different one, indicates that "*Data during this period are incomplete because of the lag in time between when the death occurred and when the death certificate is completed, submitted to NCHS and processed for reporting purposes. This delay can range from 1 week to 8 weeks or more, depending on the jurisdiction, age, and cause of death." We would have to make sure that the multi-year low is not an artifact of data delays. --Dan Polansky (talk) 08:53, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
CDC could do better. The blue-bar graph is exactly the kind of graph which we need (kudos to CDC!), but there should be some indication of the data-delay-caused inaccuracy directly in the graph; this could be done by showing a couple of the rightmost bars in a different color, or by including a disclaimer note directly in the graph. --Dan Polansky (talk) 10:10, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

NYT grossly misrepresents NYC deaths

NYT grossly misrepresents NYC deaths. It follows from NYT article making incorrect claims about double of usual deaths and showing a grossly misleading graph (or outright wrong) when compared with CDC1 and CDC2. I can hardly believe my eyes. Have I made a mistake? Please double check. --Dan Polansky (talk) 06:58, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

They are measuring different things. CDC is measuring by COVID on the death certificate, which would be there if COVID were confirmed. The New York Time's analysis is analyzing total deaths in monthly time windows, and claiming that the month ending on 4 April had an excess mortality of 5,330 (9,780 deaths minus the average). The excess deaths are not all confirmed COVID, but one may assume that COVID is the mostly likely culprit.--Pestilence Unchained (talk) 07:09, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
No no, both CDC sources are showing all-cause totals, not only covid-positive. Check the graph with blue bars at CDC1 in section Mortality Surveillance; the blue bars are all-cause totals. --Dan Polansky (talk) 07:20, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
In CDC2, check Table 4, which has for New York City 14,535 all-cause deaths for weeks ending 2/1/2020 to 4/4/2020. This is for about two months (Feb, Mar), and yields 7267 deaths per month in Feb and Mar for all-cause deaths in NYC. Where does the article have 9,780 deaths from? They state CDC2 as their source, but CDC2 does not have such a figure. --Dan Polansky (talk) 07:30, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
They are performing a synthesis of sources to extract provisional real time data: "Source: New York Times analysis of provisional data from the National Center for Health Statistics, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.". They also note: "Notes: Counted deaths for the month ending April 4 include an additional 1,396 coronavirus deaths reported by the city that have not yet been added to the C.D.C. data.". They also write that the data reported to the CDC often arrives there late.--Pestilence Unchained (talk) 07:32, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
Thank you. How do they know that the 1,396 deaths are additional? The whole point of looking at totals is that we do not know whether the covid-positive deaths are additional. And what is the source of the baseline monthly deaths for March, for NYC? --Dan Polansky (talk) 07:42, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
Here's my best calculation of monthly NYC deaths: In List of sovereign states and dependent territories by mortality rate, I find the death rate of 8.15 per thousand inhabitants per year in 2017 for the U.S.; in NYC, I find about 8,400,000 population estimate for New York City for 2018; by combining the two figures, I get 5705 deaths per month. But it would be better to have actuals based on NYC statistics. --Dan Polansky (talk) 07:52, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
From cuny.edu[3], we get 6.4 per 1,000 POP for NYC for 2016, which, using the 8,400,000 pop above, yields 4480 deaths per month for NYC; this does not account for month-seasonal variation, and a proper exercise would look at past years' March death values in NYC. --Dan Polansky (talk) 08:16, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
As for data delay, CDC1 indicates "Based on death certificate data available on April 9, 2020, 6.9% of all deaths occurring during the week ending April 4, 2020 (week 14) [...]", and their data in the graph ends io Apr 4 while the data availability was Apr 9, accounting for possible 5 day delay. What CDC does not know on Apr 9 it does not report, as it should not. --Dan Polansky (talk) 08:21, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
The 1,396 additional COVID coded deaths are a noted difference between their data sets: city health vs. CDC (which receives data at a lag). How do they know the COVID coded deaths are additional? Well if the CDC reports around 2,000 and city health reports 3,350 then it is easy to say the 1,396 are additional. The main datapoint from the NYT's analysis of sources is that they are claiming 9,780 death for march (and are saying that this is an undercount, as data is still arriving for March), which they contrast with typical deaths (which they peg at around 4.4k given they say 9,780 is 5,330 over normal).--Pestilence Unchained (talk) 08:24, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
That's fair enough. Not that I entirely trust it but it has some plausibility. Let's see how this gets reflected in the CDC graph in the coming days and weeks. --Dan Polansky (talk) 08:42, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
2 comments to do about the NYT data, 1) They cheekily put the base deaths per month at the bottom, the bar look even more bleek then it should. 2) Most plausible models should expect higher death starting in March (oh wait.. that's what they say) Iluvalar (talk) 15:58, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Underreporting of deaths

The current sentences on underreporting make it a limited and perhaps Western phenomenon (Italy, US), and consequently implicitly the high death toll mostly a Western issue. The underreporting is likely much more widespread and can be unintentional (lack of testing, counting methodology) or deliberate (covering up the true death toll). There's a range of countries with suspected significant undercounting, as reported by the better news media: Brazil [4], China [5], Iran [6], North Korea [7], Russia [8], and the UK [9]. In summary, the deadly impact of the pandemic is likely much bigger and much more global, and in case of deliberate underreporting connected to a wider (geo)political situation. Is there a reason why this isn't included in the article (in a balanced and well-sourced way)? Morgengave (talk) 09:52, 11 April 2020 (UTC)

Probably because we're trying to keep the page down to a sensible length - there are many other sub-topics covered briefly. If you feel you can improve it, go ahead! Robertpedley (talk) 15:15, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
Ok, I just added it in one sentence. Can someone help with the reference formatting? Morgengave (talk) 15:58, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
Ok, we see underreporting of deaths in many countries, but does that really point to an increased deadly impact of the pandemic? The values of the infected person which do not die at all seems to be much bigger. Even in switzerland, austria and germany, where reporting seems to be as best as possible, the number of undetected infected is considerered to be at least a ratio 3 according to newest information, and i do not really think the virus has different letality in different contries. So i think it is all about detection. The infection progressed much quicker and much more far than we thought. Regarding the general question in how far, deaths could hide it might be an idea to compare the deaths to those regularly occuring in a season. Comparing the daily deaths in switzerland we see a number in the range of a regular deaths caused by lung deseases in the former year without corona. StatistikusMaximus (talk) 03:34, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

15843 deaths Spain, not 15483

Mistake in the table. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.151.33.234 (talk • contribs) 13:38, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Fixed. It is now higher. --MarioGom (talk) 14:15, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

@Tenryuu: The discussion only seems to be about coronavirus cases, while here I am using it for population statistics. sam1370 (talk) 04:12, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

Sam1370, this doesn't seem to be the right section. I have no idea what you're talking about. Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝) 05:52, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
@Tenryuu: Oh, sorry. I'm not sure what happened. I replied to you on the other section with mobile and it didn't appear so I just decided to do it when I could on desktop later. Apparently it appeared here?

Wrong info

Moved to Template talk:2019–20 coronavirus pandemic data § How to denote missing data

RfC: Formatting of sentence about xenophobia

RESOLVED
It appears unlikely that further discussion will yield more than the following rough consensus. The points that appear to have consensus include: "Asians" and "Southeast Asia" are too broad, but "Chinese" alone is too narrow; "perceived as being" is better than "of descent" because the discrimination is based on visual perceptions, not on genealogy; "hotspots" sounds disrespectful; discrimination is also against those perceived as "Europeans/Caucasians"; the text for the "other" discriminated people should avoid giving undue weight. The beginning "as well as" would not work in the present lead since the discrimination is not purely online, so I modified that. The consensus text for the lead of 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic is:
  • and there have been incidents of xenophobia and discrimination against Chinese people and against those perceived as being Chinese or as being from areas with high infection rates.
  • The first three references (2 China, 1 "caucasians" in Thailand) present in this version of 20:15, 10 April 2020 should be kept in support of the phrase. The Kenya reference is about one Frenchman in Kenya reporting an anecdote of discrimination against himself, and could be better replaced by a stronger reference.
Boud (talk) 20:41, 10 April 2020 (UTC) (uninvolved non-admin)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The sentence about xenophobia and racism related to the pandemic keeps getting edited back and forth by me and other users, so I believe it's appropriate to create an RfC about it. The current formatting of the sentence is "Misinformation and conspiracy theories about the virus have spread online as well as xenophobia and discrimination against Chinese people, people of Asian descent, and others from hotspots.", added by me.

Three versions of the sentence have been included lately:

  1. ...as well as xenophobia and discrimination against Chinese people and people of Asian descent. (Sentence mentioning discrimination against people of Asian descent only.)
  2. ...as well as xenophobia and discrimination against Chinese people, people of Asian descent, and others from hotspots. (Sentence mentioning discrimination against people from other hotspots, but highlighting Asians.)
  3. ...while xenophobia and discrimination against various ethnic groups has increased internationally. (More ambiguous formatting not mentioning specific groups.)

So I am asking, which the three versions is the most appropriate and neutral. It's also worth asking, if the word "Asians" should specify "East Asians", considering Asian is quite a wide term, at least in most usages. --Tiiliskivi (talk) 11:18, 2 April 2020 (UTC)

Also, the sentences about misinformation/conspiracy and xenophobia/racism should probably be split in two separate sentences, since the current "as well as" formatting implies that the discrimination is happening exclusively online. --Tiiliskivi (talk) 11:24, 2 April 2020 (UTC)
  • I'm not sure what's been happening in the past 24hr or so, but there have been plenty of other versions beyond those recently. When I last checked in, it was Misinformation and conspiracy theories about the virus have spread online and there have been incidents of xenophobia and racism against Chinese and other East and Southeast Asian people. I think the "and there have been incidents of" was better, for the reason you mentioned that xenophobia hasn't just been online. The "others from hotspots" was language I added to consolidate after someone else added a full sentence about discrimination against Europeans, which was way too much in my view. At that point, I used "against Chinese people, other Asians, and others" but it was subsequently changed by someone who reasonably objected that "Asians" was too broad a category, given that there hasn't been significant discrimination against e.g. Indians (it had also been that way at some prior point, so yeah, lots of back and forth, and thanks for opening a forum for discussion about this). There is also room for discussion about "Asian" vs. "Asian descent" vs. "Asian descent or appearance". It gets tricky. I support option 2 since most of the incidents have been against Asian people, so that should be noted, but not to the total exclusion of incidents against others. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 11:56, 2 April 2020 (UTC)
  • Option 1 I am not sure why did you start a RfC before even discussing this. I wouldn't mention Xenophobia against people from "hotspots" in the lead. The Xenophobia is mainly against Asians.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 12:09, 2 April 2020 (UTC)
  • The sentence originally included the words "East Asian and Southeast Asian" not "Asian". I don't know why "Asian" has been suggested when the term "Asian" refers to so many different groups. More than 1 billion Asians (most South Asians, Southeast Asians and Central Asians) aren't even experiencing any racism so to use "Asian" provides an incorrect image that suggests all Asians are facing discrimination. In Asia, itself, it is only those with Chinese (East Asian) features that have faced xenophobia and racism. It makes no sense to change it to "Asian" when only part of the Asian population has been directly affected by this. Additionally, xenophobia and racism have increased towards Westerners so this needs to be pointed out as well. (Sapah3 (talk) 02:52, 3 April 2020 (UTC))
  • Note: Contributors to this RfC may also be interested in the one at Talk:2020 coronavirus pandemic in the United States#RfC about whether or not to include a sentence on xenophobia in the lead of that article. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 02:49, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
  • I support the implementation of option 2 into the lede. I however object to the use of "Asian". "Asian" should be changed to "East Asian and Southeast Asian". So far only Asians that have East Asian features are facing discrimination (that includes many Southeast Asians). Some Indians (South Asians), like the incident in Israel, have faced discrimination but that's only because of their East Asian features. Most Indians with typical South Asian features aren't facing discrimination, neither are Central Asians or Southeast Asians like Malays, Indonesians or East Timorese who mostly have typical Southeast Asian features. (Sapah3 (talk) 02:58, 3 April 2020 (UTC))
Sapah3 - You provided citations. I agree that we use "East Asian and Southeast Asian" as per: "and there have been numerous incidents of xenophobia and discrimination initially against Chinese people and people of East Asian and Southeast Asian descent, and increasingly against people from hotspots in Europe, the United States and other countries as the pandemic spreads around the globe."Iswearius (talk) 03:31, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
@Iswearius: Thank you for your cooperation in resolving this, I appreciate it. (Sapah3 (talk) 06:59, 3 April 2020 (UTC))
@Iswearius and Sapah3: I'm glad you two have found agreement on using "East and Southeast Asian". I'm fine letting that stand as the prevailing consensus unless anyone comes along arguing for just using "Asian", in which case we'll need to discuss further. Iswearius, your edit reintroducing the language also made a few other changes, some of which seem to go against best practice and/or consensus. Namely, I don't see consensus for listing out the countries after "hotspots", so I'd ask you to please (regardless of your personal view) go back to the wording that ends with "hotspots" so as to abide by WP:STATUSQUO. (I'm not comfortable reverting you myself since I've made some other reversions recently and don't want to violate WP:3RR.) You also added back the two additional references Sapah3 added, which means that there are now six citations for that sentence. Per MOS:LEADCITE, the general best practice is to have as few citations in the lead as necessary, and my understanding is that six is way too many. The Atlantic one is alright, but the Guardian one is an opinion piece and thus a pretty weak reference, so I'd ask that you or Sapah3 remove it (or at least move it to the body). Cheers, {{u|Sdkb}} talk 07:06, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
Done. As long as the international character of the emergent hotspots, as in the sources, is reflected.Iswearius (talk) 15:02, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
I disagree with your edit since the use of "increasingly" is WP:OR and the word international is redundant since hotspots can already be/already are international. Some1 (talk) 16:02, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
Agreed with Some1. "as the pandemic spreads across the globe" also feels redundant and wordy to me. It wasn't in there originally, and since Wikipedia isn't a thesis paper we don't need to wrap up the intro with a tidy bow at the end. Iswearius or anyone else under the 3RR, would you be open to removing it for now to revert to the status quo of just ", and others from hotspot"? {{u|Sdkb}} talk 17:49, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
@Sdkb: You're free to revert to Status Quo since no consensus has been reached yet and this RfC is still ongoing. Some1 (talk) 18:14, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
@Iswearius: You've edited the sentence again, going against the prevailing consensus from Some1's and my comments, and moving away from the status quo while an active discussion is taking place here. You need to stop acting unilaterally and respect the BRD process, and if you do not do so you may face sanctions. (I'm personally ambivalent about the way you rephrased — it's better than the previous attempt — but that's beside the point about adhering to process.) {{u|Sdkb}} talk 22:43, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
Sdkb - I returned to the article and found the sentence worded in a clumsy way. I simply clarified spontaneously, no offense intended. I feel, as you mentioned, this rendition is a good compromise. Otherwise, it is not clear that the emergent hotspots are not in Asia which, in accordance with the sources, they aren't. As for the incidents pointed out below by Some1, they unfortunately concerned a now indeffed sock notorious for warring.Iswearius (talk) 02:02, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
Iswearius The edit you made, as pointed out by Sdkb above, still has issues with WP:UNDUEWEIGHT. Please stop editing the sentence until consensus is achieved. This is what this RfC/ discussion is for and if you have any suggestions, add it here and not the main text while discussion is still in progress. Sdkb, could you return it back to Status Quo? 11:49, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
Look at Iswearius's recent contributions; it's full of edit warring about the xenophobia sentence in the lead of this and the List of incidents of xenophobia and racism related to the 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic article. I'm surprised they haven't been blocked yet for their disruptive editing. Some1 (talk) 23:15, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
@Iswearius: Your rationale about why you think your version is better (which is perfectly decently argued) has no relation to the issue of whether you are willing to abide by established processes, very much including WP:STATUSQUO. You should have self-reverted. I just did so for you. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 20:33, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
Sdkb - Not at all. My suggestion is just a little something brought to the table. I wasn't aware that you were waiting for me; I was waiting for you! I leave it to debate. Although, perhaps WP:STATUSQUO may still permit "...and yet others from global hotspots".Iswearius (talk) 21:17, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
Unnecessarily wordy ("yet"?) and as I mention before with your edit, hotspots can be/already are global/international. The current wording of hotspots in the status quo is fine in regards to WP:WEIGHT and conciseness. Some1 (talk) 21:49, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
Could you be more specific? What part is WP:UNDUE exactly? Considering the majority of List of incidents of xenophobia and racism related to the 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic are incidents against Asians, more weight should be given to that in the lead per WP:DUE. SharabSalam makes a good point about xenophobia being mainly against Asians and that xenophobia against people from hotspots shouldn't be mentioned in the lead. If others want to include hotspots though, then Option 2 works best since it balances out what's due and undue. Some1 (talk) 16:23, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
It's UNDUE with regard to the significance of the issue within the article, rather than about any specific groups of people being the victim. The section devoted to it is simply too big, and any mention in the lead should also be broad and minimal. (I also don't see why panic buying should be mentioned in the lead at all). Hzh (talk) 17:08, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
  • I support option 2 and agree with Sdkb and MelanieN that adding "incidents of..." is useful for clarity. My reason for supporting option #2 is that a plurality or majority of these incidents have been directed against Asians, but there are also examples of others being targeted. -Darouet (talk) 17:27, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
  • Option 1 is closest to the truth, but as I have elaborated on in the section below, this xenophobia isn't rational or deeply thought about. China is the bogeyman and whipping boy here, so what we have is an irrational fear of people who LOOK Chinese to the people doing the discriminating. It's no more complex than that, and we must not pretend it is. HiLo48 (talk) 23:39, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
  • Option 3 the discrimination against what groups depends on were you are obviously Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:31, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
And looking at reliable sources and the List of incidents of xenophobia and racism related to the 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic‎‎ article, the common theme is discrimination against Asians in a large number of countries. Some1 (talk) 19:55, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
Yes initially for sure. And in the English language communities. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:00, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
Source for "initially"? And also not "in English language communities" only, as you can see if you actually read through the List of incidents of xenophobia and racism related to the 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic‎‎ article (Egypt, Indonesia, Israel, Japan, Philippines, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Belgium, just to list a few). Some1 (talk) 00:08, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
So in China there is discrimination again foreigners generally.[27] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 00:17, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
Yes, xenophobia is happening in other countries (that's why Option 2/the current lead includes others from hotspots); but the majority of the xenophobia has been directed towards Asians. Literally from the article you provided: "One of the most unfortunate twists in the ongoing COVID-19 emergency is the racism and xenophobia it has unleashed across the world. To be sure, much of this has been directed at Chinese and Asians generally." WP:WEIGHT Some1 (talk) 00:28, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
Not "Asians". It's ambiguous. In the UK it means people from southern Asia, i.e. people of Indian or Pakistani appearance. The discrimination has been directed against people who look Chinese to those doing the discriminating. The word "Chinese" is important. HiLo48 (talk) 00:48, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

How to describe subset of Asians that have faced the brunt of discrimination?

I'm separating out this question since it's distinct from the main one asked in the RfC above. We have a whole bunch of possible alternatives:

  1. ...against Chinese people, other Asians, and...
  2. ...against Chinese people, other people of Asian descent, and...
  3. ...against Chinese people, other East and Southeast Asians, and...
  4. ...against Chinese people, other people of East and Southeast Asian descent, and...
  5. ...against Chinese people, other people of East and Southeast Asian descent and appearance, and... (the loose status quo)

Any of these alternatives could also be used without the clause specifically about Chinese people. What do you all think is the proper balance between precision and conciseness here? {{u|Sdkb}} talk 18:56, 3 April 2020 (UTC)

  • Copying Sapah3's comment from above to start this off:

    "Asian" should be changed to "East Asian and Southeast Asian". So far only Asians that have East Asian features are facing discrimination (that includes many Southeast Asians). Some Indians (South Asians), like the incident in Israel, have faced discrimination but that's only because of their East Asian features. Most Indians with typical South Asian features aren't facing discrimination, neither are Central Asians or Southeast Asians like Malays, Indonesians or East Timorese who mostly have typical Southeast Asian features.
    — User:Sapah3

    {{u|Sdkb}} talk 18:56, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
Can I say that it doesn't make sense? Why include Southeast Asians when we are not talking about Malays, Indonesians and the likes? If you just say East Asians, that would include most people who look vaguely Chinese, including some of those from Southeast Asia like the Vietnamese. Hzh (talk) 20:17, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
The nuances of ethnic group relations get really complex, and I don't feel qualified to judge in this case. I've put out some invites to pertinent WikiProjects, so hopefully we'll get some editors here with better expertise. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 20:41, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
This isn't about nuances of ethnic group relations. This is about irrational fear of people with slanty eyes. I know that term became politically incorrect back in the 1970s, and we invented inaccurate terms like "Asian" and its variations to replace it, but in these frightened times those applying this discrimination aren't thinking carefully about the ancestral and ethnic background of the people they discriminate against. China is the bogeyman here, so they discriminate against people who LOOK Chinese to THEM. Nothing more sophisticated than that. Anything more complex on our part is synthesis and original research. HiLo48 (talk) 23:17, 3 April 2020 (UTC)
That's what I think, too. Most of the incidents occur against the Chinese or those who look Chinese. As you said, those doing the discriminating aren't thinking of the ancestral or ethnic background of the people they're discriminating against. I would suggest wording it to "...against Chinese people and people of East Asian descent and appearance..." or "...against Chinese people and people of East Asian appearance..." Some1 (talk)
Part of my point is that East Asian tends to have no meaning to the haters. It's simply China and people who look Chinese to the them who are the target. Not East Asia, which is a vague term at the best of times anyway. Some of them probably don't even know that China is in eastern Asia. HiLo48 (talk) 00:08, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
How would you personally word it? "...against Chinese people and people who look Chinese...", "...against Chinese people and people of Chinese appearance...", "...against Chinese people and people of Chinese features..." or something else? Some1 (talk) 00:19, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
Not sure how I'd word it, but I think the words "to them" or similar need to be there. Maybe something along the lines of "...xenophobia and discrimination against people who look Chinese to those doing the discriminating". Feel free to massage those words. HiLo48 (talk) 00:27, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
I actually agree with what Hzh (talk · contribs), HiLo48 (talk · contribs) and Some1 (talk · contribs) are saying. I noticed a similar incident at the List of incidents of xenophobia and racism related to the 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic where there was disagreement over the use of "Southeast Asian" because the Asians that have been facing discrimination are those who look Chinese and that's why other East Asians (Japanese, Koreans etc.), many Southeast Asians (Vietnamese, some Thais, some Filipinos) and a few South Asians (Indians with East Asian features) have faced discrimination because they look "Chinese". The original statement on this page and the List of incidents of xenophobia and racism related to the 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic page was "...against Chinese people and people of East Asian appearance..." but other users came in and added "Southeast Asian". The only reason why I included "Southeast Asian" in my suggestion above was because I didn't want what happened at the List of incidents of xenophobia and racism related to the 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic page to happen here and that included all this edit warring between different users. (Sapah3 (talk) 01:01, 4 April 2020 (UTC))
I would say it's mainly against Chinese people. Some people mistakenly think some other Asians are Chinese, like Japanese etc. However, their only phobia is against Chinese. How about saying there has been increase in Sinophobia because of the coronavirus. This term is used in some sources and I think it is more suitable here. It includes Chinese culture, food etc. People have stopped editing in Chinese restaurants because of this coronavirus. Otherwise, I think discrimination against Chinese people is enough.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 01:18, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
Using Sinophobia could be a good solution if we can figure out a good way to phrase it. The obvious downside is that "sinophobia" is a fancy word that not everyone will know without having to click on the link. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 01:31, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
That sounds like a good solution to me; it avoids the Asian descent/appearance distinction problem above. Just curious how this would be added on. Is it to replace the xenophobia sentence above (which will replace the List of incidents of xenophobia and racism related to the 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic link with the sinophobia link)? Some1 (talk) 12:06, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
(edit conflict) See [28], [29], [30] and many other sources in a similar vein which I have not listed. This is wider than anti-Chinese, and Sinophobia is just a handy term which doesn't quite fit the actual situation. IMO, there are at least two factors here, (1) denigration of asianish persons for anything disagreeable which can be tied to asia and (2) denigration of anyone who can be seen as different from the denigrator. (1) is a subset of (2), and WP isn't going to be able to solve that problem. Classing it as a problem without citing a supporting source could be said to be both WP:OR and WP:POV (and I'm not arguing either way here on the POV question except to observe that, if there is such a question, WP:DUE deals with that), but it could also be said that it is beyond the proper scope of this article to get into the weeds about that; WP:SS pushes that down into that article wikilinked from here, along with the question of whether that article title is POV. All of that is just my own not thoroughly thought out and not-quite-mainstream opinion. On the question posed by the header of this section, I think the current wording in the article does a pretty good job of walking that tightrope. Wtmitchell (talk) (earlier Boracay Bill) 12:47, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

@Sdkb: - May I suggest "...and there have been incidents of xenophobia and discrimination against Chinese and those perceived as being Chinese, as well as against people from emergent hotspots around the globe."Iswearius (talk) 12:36, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

"as well as against people from emergent hotspots around the globe." is unnecessarily wordy and gives WP:UNDUEWEIGHT and prominence to hotspots. The "incidents of xenophobia and discrimination" against Chinese people/people of East and Southeast Asian descent and appearance/etc. are far greater and widespread (per the news sources) than "incidents of xenophobia and discrimination" "against people from emergent hotspots." That's what the top RfC is for and so far, there's more voting for "and others from hotspots" to include hotspots, but also keep it short and concise to avoid WP:UNDUEWEIGHT issues; but there's also quite a few voting to remove hotspots entirely from the lead. Some1 (talk) 12:50, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
Some1 - I beg to differ. As MelanieN, Darouet and others have pointed out, the discrimination is not Asian specific; it has occurred, and is occurring against people from major global hotspots, such as New York and Italy, as per the article "List of incidents of xenophobia and racism related to the 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic".Iswearius (talk) 13:13, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
I agree that it's occurring, I never said it wasn't. As I stated above, "incidents of xenophobia and discrimination" against Chinese people/people of East and Southeast Asian descent and appearance/etc. are far greater [in numbers] and widespread (per the news sources) than "incidents of xenophobia and discrimination" "against people from emergent hotspots." That's why if we're including hotspots in the lead, then Option 2 with "and others from hotspots" works since it avoids WP:UNDUE WEIGHT issues (and Option 2 is what MelanieN and Darouet voted for, with Darouet stating in their vote: "plurality or majority of these incidents have been directed against Asians, but there are also examples of others being targeted."). Some1 (talk) 13:22, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
In the proposed rendition of the sentence, there are already twice as many words supporting the Asian component (Chinese and those perceived as being Chinese) as there are supporting the hotspots (emergent hotspots around the globe). I feel that is sufficient. Let us not belittle the suffering of thousands.Iswearius (talk) 13:49, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
Actually, in your proposed rendition, it's "against the Chinese and those perceived as being Chinese" versus "as well as against people from emergent hotspots around the globe". That's giving WP:UNDUE weight/prominence to hotspots in that sentence. That's why Option 2: "and others from hotspots" works if we want to mention hotspots and to avoid UNDUEWEIGHT. Some1 (talk) 14:10, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
I'm sorry. To me, "...and others from hotspots" comes across as scant and a tad disrespectful. Let's see how the others feel.Iswearius (talk) 14:37, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
Yes, others should chime in. Also, please read Wikipedia:Civility while you're at it.(Iswearius clarified their comment after my comment) We edit based on reliable sources, what reliable sources say, and Wikipedia policy such as WP:WEIGHT, WP:OR, etc. not what we perceive as "disrespectful" and the likes. Some1 (talk) 14:46, 4 April 2020 (UTC)Some1 (talk) 15:15, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
No offense intended. We are working together.Iswearius (talk) 14:59, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
Bring reliable sources that prove that there is a notable xenophobia against people from hotspots. Xenophobia is mainly against Chinese people. Also, the problem here is that American understanding of the word "Asian" is different from other countries. To me the word "Asians" refers to people from India, Bangladesh, Pakistan etc. See our article for more about this (Asians). Sinophobia has been used by many sources. E.g [31]. It's better and more encyclopedic. "Chinese appearance" is not used by any source and it sounds really weird.--SharʿabSalam▼ (talk) 16:52, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

I prefer #3 but without the “Chinese people,” this is one of those things that gets really complicated though... By Chinese people we generally mean all people of Chinese descent, but what should we say when we have a case like Taiwan or Singapore where people of Chinese descent are discriminating against people of Chinese national origin? If the context is generalized global racism/xenophobia/etc then we should be as broad as possible because from news reports it seems like people from Vietnam, South Korea, etc are being just as victimized in countries like the USA, UK, South Africa, etc as those from China. Horse Eye Jack (talk) 15:26, 4 April 2020 (UTC)

People who "appear to be Chinese" or people who have a "Chinese appearance". Bus stop (talk) 16:05, 4 April 2020 (UTC)
Yes, this is heading in the right direction. I like the first part of suggestion above from Iswearius - "...and there have been incidents of xenophobia and discrimination against Chinese and those perceived as being Chinese." Forget the other hot spot stuff for now. HiLo48 (talk) 00:35, 5 April 2020 (UTC)
I thought about this some more after reading Wtmitchell and SharabSalam's comments above. Does "perceived to be Chinese"/"Chinese looking"/"Chinese appearance"/etc. constitute as WP:Original Research and have reliable sources used those terms? (I only found one article using those terms so far [32]). As SharabSalam pointed out, the word "Asian" is too broad and can mean different things to different countries, that's why Choices #1 and #2 won't work. In the USA, "Asians" typically refers to East and Southeast Asians. [33][34][35][36][37] Here's an Australian article which states "directed at Chinese Australians and Asian Australians" [38] I think #5 (the current lead/ status quo) does a decent job of defining "Asian". Some1 (talk) 02:41, 5 April 2020 (UTC)
"Asian" is bad. The people doing the discriminating aren't thinking "Asian". They are thinking "Chinese". Israelis are Asian. HiLo48 (talk) 05:18, 5 April 2020 (UTC)
As I stated in my previous comment: "Asian" is too broad... that's why Choices #1 and #2 won't work." "#5 (the current lead/ status quo) does a decent job of defining "Asian"". Some1 (talk) 05:39, 5 April 2020 (UTC)
But that still includes "other people of East and Southeast Asian descent and appearance". That definitely doesn't work. The discrimination is against people who the discriminators think look Chinese. Euphemisms involving the word "Asian", no matter how they are qualified, are not what the haters are thinking. Donald Trump is calling this the Chinese virus, not the East and Southeast Asian virus. He knows that will fire up the bigots. HiLo48 (talk) 05:47, 5 April 2020 (UTC)
Yes, I would remove Southeast Asian. The same argument against Asian would apply to Southeast Asian, since the vast majority of Indonesians and Malays don't look anything like the Chinese (same for many other Southeast Asians) and they form a significant part of Southeast Asians. Note also that Asians in Britain typically refer to South Asians. Hzh (talk) 13:22, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
Thanks for repeating that UK perspective. It seems a lot of people who think "Asian" is a nice way to refer to people from China and those who look a bit similar are completely aware that in Britain the word doesn't mean that at all. It means someone from places like India and Pakistan. It's like that with political correctness and euphemisms. They come into use without formal definition, and remain that way, with quite confusing results. In this global encyclopaedia we must not use "Asian" in any form to mean people who look like they might have come from China. And it's the latter characteristic that this is all about, people who look like they might have come from China. HiLo48 (talk) 00:18, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
  • I'd say drop the subject and pick any sentence that is approximately accurate. How many covid-linked deaths from xenophobia are there? People are dying, economies including small businesses are taking a massive hit (possibly an unnecessary one), and we are discussing xenophobia? Come on, people. --Dan Polansky (talk) 09:46, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
I disagree. Currently, the last paragraph of the lead summarizes notable impacts of the pandemic (such as panic buying, closures, misinformation, xenophobia, and environmental impacts). The xenophobia/ racism part is relevant and notable, and its current placement in the lead is appropriate and fitting. In addition to the 3 links provided by Wtmitchell above and the links in my previous comment [39][40][41][42][43][44] above, here are some more coverage of xenophobia/racism (against Asians) by major and reliable news sources: [45][46][47][48][49][50][51][52][53][54][55] There's more examples at: List of incidents of xenophobia and racism related to the 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic. As for "pick any sentence that is approximately accurate", the current wording/ status quo does the most decent job at summarizing all this. Some1 (talk) 19:50, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
For most who care about human lives and livelihoods, xenophobia is under the radar screen. Let's get serious. Xenophobia is probably to stay in the article for the lack of consensus, but let's waste no more discussion time on things that, when related to the huge impacts, are negligible. And on the linked page I read "An online petition to prevent people from China from entering the country was signed by more than 18,000 people" as an example of xenophobia, which is ridiculous. Let's get real. --Dan Polansky (talk) 08:09, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
This xenophobia topic might not be a big deal for other editors (which can be expected since Wikipedia has diversity issues and the majority of Wikipedia editors are "white men" [56][57][58][59][60][61]), but we should go by what reliable sources state and reliable sources do establish xenophobia's relevance and notability (particularly against the Chinese and Asians) in regards to this pandemic. Some1 (talk) 13:28, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
As far as I am concerned, mainstream media are not reliable sources on epidemiology, and actually not much on anything. Mainstream media have been shown to systematically misreport on science, shown e.g. by Ben Goldacre, and people who know some science and are paying attention can attest to Goldacre's conclusion. I do not know how Wikipedia plays this game, but, as a matter of fact, fairly reliable sources on science are scientific journals, not mainstream media. Mainstream media are in the business of creating a constant stream of news and issues since this is how they earn their living; accuracy, balance and intellectual honesty usually suffers. --Dan Polansky (talk) 17:38, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
Well, I am not sure how useful what I wrote above really is. Mainstream media are fundamentally unreliable but they are used by Wikipedia, and they are probably more reliable on some matters and less reliable on other matters. Maybe Wikipedia needs a reform in that regard; I don't know. --Dan Polansky (talk) 17:42, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Latest info from NIOSH/CDC

Industry Specific Resources 

   Airline, Airport, and Transit Worker Fact Sheets
   Airline, airport, and transit workers may be at risk for exposure to COVID-19. CDC recommends steps to prevent exposure, which includes everyday actions to prevent the spread of respiratory illness. To learn more, fact sheets are available for airline, airport, and transit workers.

Small Businesses 

   Prepare your Small Business and Employees for the Effects of COVID-19 
   CDC has developed guidance to help small businesses limit the economic and community impacts of an outbreak of COVID-19. This new guidance provides steps to protect employees and prepare small businesses for disruption. A fact sheet also outlines 10 steps small business employers can take now to protect their employees’ health.

Healthcare Workers 

   Strategies for Optimizing the Supply of N95 Respirators
   CDC is working with partners across the global supply chain to evaluate and respond to reported shortages in PPE, particularly N95 respirators. This week, CDC updated guidance on Strategies to Optimize the Supply of N95 Respirators and released an accompanying Summary for Healthcare Facilities. 

   Elastomeric Respirators for U.S. Healthcare Delivery During N95 Shortages
   This recorded webinar provides an overview of respiratory protection and guidance surrounding supply shortages. It also provides information on infection prevention measures, strategies for optimizing the supply of N95 respirators, and a broad overview of the use of elastomeric respirators in healthcare.

   Updated Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) Burn Rate Calculator
   CDC designed the PPE Burn Rate Calculator to help healthcare and nonhealthcare systems, such as correctional facilities, track how quickly PPE will be used at those facilities. This week CDC updated the tool, so it can now calculate the average PPE consumption rate per patient. Facilities can enter the number of patients in their facility and track changes in PPE usage as the number of patients fluctuates.

Is this the best page to include some of this information? TMorata (talk) 13:39, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

there are specific articles for each topic raised above--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 17:46, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

Showing death counts without per capita is a disgrace

I increasing think that showing covid-positive death counts without showing per capita figures is a disgrace and must stop. If you cannot publish per capita figures alongside, or at least average all-cause daily deaths in the region (say in 2017, we have data for that), don't show any counts at all and delegate that publishing task to sources that can do that.

(A similar discussion was Talk:2019–20 coronavirus_pandemic/Archive 27#Putting per capita figures into the article. It did not get anywhere. Something must be done. This must stop.)

--Dan Polansky (talk) 08:00, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

Dan Polansky: Absolute death counts per country and territory is one of the two figures, along with confirmed cases, that can be found in every single reliable source (WP:RS) publishing worldwide statistics about COVID-19: World Health Organization, ECDC, Reuters, The New York Times, Bloomberg, BBC, El País, Berliner Morgenpost, South China Morning Post and Johns Hopkins University, just to name a few. --MarioGom (talk) 08:18, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
Copying myself from before regarding the table data:

I support this per Dan Polansky's rationale. It's not as vital as it is with the maps, since there's not the misleading implication that a measure of density is being displayed, but it'd still be very useful information for readers. Regarding how to implement, though, the table would need a new column each for cases, deaths, and recoveries, and there's definitely not room for three more columns, even if we move the references to the name column (which I think we should do regardless—there's no need for them to have their own column). Instead, I'd favor including a separate table in the article with the per capita counts.

{{u|Sdkb}} talk 08:20, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
Sdkb: I agree it is useful in the maps, which we already have. If we add a new table, I would suggest that it is updated at most once a day based on WHO Situation Reports. Or calculate it automatically based on data from {{2019–20 coronavirus pandemic data}}. I don't think we have the capacity to keep up with real-time updates manually for yet another table. See the statistics for the current table: 15,808 total edits, 2,570 in the last 7 days. --MarioGom (talk) 08:35, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
@MarioGom: the population data is pretty stable (let's hope), so yeah, it could be calculated automatically once set up. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 08:38, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
I propose to add daily all-case deaths per region as a column, for a recent year for which we have data. I know of data for 2017. Then, we won't need to recalculate and keep updating anything: the figures are of past (say 2017) and once entered, will need no update at all. And it will provide all the context that is required, I think. --Dan Polansky (talk) 08:43, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
Dan, that's not the way that epidemics work. They start in small communities in each country however large the country. Do remember that this one started in the country with the largest population in the world and they managed to essentially contain within one fairly small province. In the US by contrast it has taken hold in many states across the nation (9 states with more than 10,000 cases and 26 more with more than 1,000) reflecting the uncertain way in which the government reacted. Chris55 (talk) 10:53, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
I output relevant results at B:User:Dan_Polansky/COVID-19#Deaths in context. This or some other context data needs be added to the table to prevent a disgrace. I need something like consensus to expand the table. The table needs some context. Let's be professional and uphold some minimum ethical standards for publishing epidemiological data. --Dan Polansky (talk) 11:51, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
Yes, the data item for China is pretty meaningless because of the dilution; we would need average daily deaths for Wuhan, and average daily deaths for Lombardy; data to my hands, please. --Dan Polansky (talk) 11:56, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
Let's do a little exercise and consider Italy: 17127 covid-positive deaths; 1667 average daily 2017 deaths. Let us assume (wrongly) that the covid-positive deaths are covid-additional deaths. Let us assume that the Italian covid-additional deaths were generated during 30 days. We get 570 covid-additional deaths per day beyond the baseline 1667 deaths per day. Let's go further: Italy has 5 ventilators per 100 000 ppl while Germany has 30 per 100 000 ppl, per W:Template:Hospital beds by country and W:List of countries and dependencies by population; please double check that I got the division right. Better look specifically at Lombardy: what are the covid-positive deaths there, what are the average daily deaths in 2017 there, how many ventilators there per 100 000 ppl, and how many ICU beds there (7 ICU beds per 100 000 ppl per [62]); I don't have the other data now. Let's look at the data; there is a lot to see there. --Dan Polansky (talk) 12:19, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
Which leads us to the following falsifiable (and hence scientific) hypothesis:
The covid outbreak has only moderately severe health outcomes, and the outcomes are moderately severe only in regions with poor ICU bed counts per capita, poor ventilator counts per capita or too high pre-covid load of these resources in percentual terms; in other regions, covid is pretty much a non-event healthwise.
What are the data items refuting the above hypothesis? Maybe there are; I don't know; I know nothing or close to nothing. --Dan Polansky (talk) 12:36, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
Yes, the table should include per capita incidence & death rate - this will show for example that Belgium & Switzerland are proportionately much more severely affected than the US. Jim Michael (talk) 12:49, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
Thank you. And yet, Switzerland's weekly total deaths[63], while showing something like covid-driven growth in the last weeks, show nothing worse than what was seen in 2017, per graph in the same source. --Dan Polansky (talk) 12:54, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
A side-effect of this pandemic will be that some causes of death will be significantly lower this year. For example, far fewer people travelling will mean that far fewer people die in transport accidents. However, this article is primarily about incidents & deaths from this virus rather than overall numbers of deaths or death rates. Jim Michael (talk) 13:16, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
That is true. Still, the all-cause number of deaths per day or week seems to be a more reliable measure of impact of covid than the covid-positive deaths as long as these are not properly distingushed from covid-caused deaths. --Dan Polansky (talk) 13:26, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
Furthermore, ourworldindata.org for Switzerland shows that road injuries form a small fraction of all deaths, the leading causes being cardiovascular, cancers and dementia. --Dan Polansky (talk) 13:47, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
@Jim Michael: The article does include things like the mortality impact of the reduction in pollution in China, which is estimated to have saved 77,000 lives. But I take your overall point. I don't think we need to get into a bunch of complicated analysis about baseline death rates and all that to make the case for having data per capita; it's simply what you said about being able to compare Belgium and Switzerland to the U.S., and that's enough. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 17:43, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
(outdent) Let's expand the Italy exercise: The premature deaths due to air pollution in Italy in 2016 were 76200 in total[64], which is 6350 per month. That is compared to 17127 covid-positive deaths in 2020. --Dan Polansky (talk) 07:58, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
  • I still cannot see how it is so bad to report counts in the same way that is done by 11 reliable sources (see my comment above), including the World Health Organization. --MarioGom (talk) 08:52, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
    It is pretty obvious. I don't know why it is not obvious to those "reliable" sources. I do not find these sources reliable as for choice of manner of presentation of figures. Let's use our thinking capacity, and pay attention. Authority fallacy is a fallacy. Let's engage the brain. And let's be ethical. What these sources are doing is unethical; they probably do not realize as much, but it is unethical anyway. Anyway, I prefer #Expand the table with average daily all-cause deaths for 2017. --Dan Polansky (talk) 09:55, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
    And some of these sources are showing graphs with case counts and death counts without test counts in the same graph or any other graph; that is also unethical, I believe. I know they are aggregating multiple data sources, but any data source they are using that provides case counts without test counts is either unreliably incompenent or has an ulterior motive. --Dan Polansky (talk) 10:01, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
    Let's do some calibration: at one point BBC showed a world graph with colored regions where the colors were based on absolute numbers of covid confirmed cases rather than densities. Then they stopped and started to use a different kind of graph, having learned the lesson. BBC is pretty respectable, but they also make mistakes, and it is good that they are learning from their mistakes. --Dan Polansky (talk) 10:03, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
Dan Polansky: It is pretty obvious. I don't know why it is not obvious to those "reliable" sources. [...] What these sources are doing is unethical Maybe you are right. Or maybe not. In any case, this seems a perfect example of WP:GREATWRONGS. We do use cases/deaths per capita in some maps, which are already presented in some articles. There is some support by reliable sources to use per-capita counts for the purpose of colorizing maps. --MarioGom (talk) 11:00, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
Not too long ago, someone was claiming that per-capita maps were original research, on this talk page. What is the problem, finding reliable sources that publish per-capita? I believe ourworldindata would have published the per-capita figures alongside their maps, but I would have to look. --Dan Polansky (talk) 12:14, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
Dan, I think you need to take a few hours away from the laptop. You're getting increasingly hysterical about these things, and i note that you are repeating how you personally disagree with reliable sources. That's on you. But Wikipedia uses numerous reliable sources and presents them in graph and table form. The analysis of those figures is for the reader, not the editor. You might feel very invested about adding a form of original research, or correcting what you think is a significant oversight, but ultimately, Wiki is not here to placate your fears. Take some breaths and come back without the "fire and fury". doktorb wordsdeeds 11:05, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
Showing death counts without per capita is indeed a disgrace, so we ought to use per capita figures especially where the use of raw deaths would be misleading. I had to insist on the inclusion of the per capita map. But it seems that the number of declared cases and deaths may be influenced by policies in place for the pandemic. Having said that, we need to work with what we are given by our sources. It's now well-documented that two-thirds to three-quarters of deaths are people who had co-morbidities, and whether the CV actually carried them off in the end can be open to discussion. The French health chief makes a point to give comparatives from an equivalent period last year. I'm not sure that such figures are available in every territory, though. -- Ohc ¡digame! 11:28, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
Let's drop the personal and focus on the substance, merits and demerits. --Dan Polansky (talk) 12:18, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
More on substance: in physics, you have to publish numbers with units of measurement. In epidemiology, the one human death without reference to anything else is the not a meaningul unit; you must relate the numbers to some other number, or you learn almost nothing and tell almost nothing. Somewhere deep, the brain might think, look, one thousand deaths, my whole tribe was wiped out. But no, the tribes or nations are no longer 1000-strong, and the population of the world is no longer 10,000 people. The unrelated figures appeal to irrational psychological forces that originated long long time ago. Publishing such unrelated figures amounts to yellow yournalism. --Dan Polansky (talk) 12:31, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
We have enough columns. We do not need that table any wider. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 23:57, 9 April 2020 (UTC)

Expand the table with average daily all-cause deaths for 2017

Instead of #Showing death counts without per capita is a disgrace, I propose to expand the table with average daily all-cause deaths for 2017. I have the data from ourworldindata, and since it needs no further update once the data is put there, I find this preferable. I have created a separate heading to obtain support. Please, let us publish data in proper context and maintain some basic ethics for publishing of epidemiological data. For reference: B:User:Dan_Polansky/COVID-19#Deaths in context, which gives me a good impression. --Dan Polansky (talk) 14:32, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

and you believe your suggestion to be an improvement on the table as a whole?--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 17:19, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
Yes, I believe it is a much needed improvement. It is imperative to provide context for the death numbers. I believe it is an ethical imperative. --Dan Polansky (talk) 17:32, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

Let me give you a sample for selected countries (the only column that would be added would be 2017 Avg Daily Deaths): 

Region       Covid-Positive Deaths    2017 Avg Daily Deaths   Ratio
Algeria                      193        436       0.44
Austria                      273        217       1.26
Belgium                     2240        285       7.86
Brazil                       688       3528       0.20
Canada                       381        730       0.52
China                       3333      28036       0.12
Denmark                      218        143       1.52
Ecuador                      220        234       0.94
France                     10328       1508       6.85
Germany                     2017       2528       0.80
India                        149      25270       0.01
Indonesia                    240       4465       0.05
Iran                        4003        993       4.03
Ireland                      210         81       2.59
Italy                      17127       1667      10.27
Mexico                       141       1936       0.07
Netherlands                 2248        393       5.72
Norway                        93        107       0.87
Peru                         107        376       0.28
Philippines                  182       1747       0.10
Poland                       136       1064       0.13
Portugal                     345        304       1.13
Romania                      209        728       0.29
South Korea                  200        811       0.25
Spain                      14555       1107      13.15
Sweden                       695        241       2.88
Switzerland                  846        168       5.04
Turkey                       725       1053       0.69
United Kingdom              6159       1597       3.86
United States              12905       7564       1.71

--Dan Polansky (talk) 19:12, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

while it does introduce a different numerical angle youll need many more editor opinions for this to happen...IMO--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 20:51, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
Yes ! I love it. She should add 2 notes for context : 1) The typical death for pneumonia at this time of year is 7-8%. 2) The amount of tests done vary wildly from country to country and it's likely to be the main cause of such variation. Italy and Spain went trough a lot of tests per capita before reaching their plateau. Iluvalar (talk) 21:19, 8 April 2020 (UTC)
@Ozzie10aaaa: Please indicate what are the substantive arguments against adding the column, and if you are opposed to adding the column, please indicate clearly that you are opposed, ideally with substantive reasoning to meet the Wikipedia consensus-building standard. --Dan Polansky (talk) 05:36, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
So what are you trying to prove? That COVID deaths aren't that significant? That COVID deaths are inflated? By putting average deaths from 2017 next to current deaths from a specific pandemic next to each other, you are creating confusion. It's adding stats for the sake of it. Nothing constructive other than wanting to feel involved by messing around, potentially dangerously, with statistics. doktorb wordsdeeds 10:46, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
Adding this column would be original research. --MarioGom (talk) 10:53, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
A very good and valid point Mario. It would be a distraction, a pointless addition which could mislead and confuse. It's best to put this idea to bed. doktorb wordsdeeds 11:01, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
I think this is a dangerous interpretation of "original research". Please, let those who agree with me post their support. If anything misleads or confuses, it is the current presentation. Let those who disagree add some substantive arguments to the discussion. --Dan Polansky (talk) 12:00, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
As for "Nothing constructive other than wanting to feel involved by messing around, potentially dangerously, with statistics": That is personal and should be stricken out. Let us focus on the substance, which is the ethics of publishing of epidemiological data. Let us discuss merits and demerits of proposals. --Dan Polansky (talk) 12:05, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
This is not WP:OR. The CDC have been plotting pneumonia cases or a "% of all deaths" for years. [65]. Iluvalar (talk) 15:37, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
Consensus is no more columns. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 23:58, 9 April 2020 (UTC)
Can you please point me to a discussion where this was decided so I can read the arguments and the volume of participation? --Dan Polansky (talk) 07:58, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
If the concern is with the number of columns--as it should not really be--the solution is simple: replace the meaningless absolute numbers that mislead readers with per-capita figures and keep the number of columns the same. --Dan Polansky (talk) 08:01, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
I agree, in epidemiology, every data point is relative to the "at-risk population". 100 deaths relative to what? The at-risk population. It is a disgrace just to name total deaths or cases without a comparison to the relative per capita. 64.18.152.49 (talk) 03:26, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

re Iluvalar: I don't think the CDC plots cases relative to average daily death rate from 3 years before. First, that would assume that world death rates are stable. They are not. In 2-3 years some countries have non-negligible changes, usually decreases, but also increases (e.g. Syria). That way of averaging also assumes that death rate is perfectly stable across the whole year and can be averaged in this way, instead of using comparable periods such as quarters. And yes, it is WP:OR until you can find reliable sources, preferably in medicine, handling data in this way. --MarioGom (talk) 14:32, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

By the way, I have no doubt that in a near future we will see proper epidemiological studies comparing data to all kinds of indicators from this year. At that point I would have no objection of using them, of course. --MarioGom (talk) 14:37, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
MarioGom, Did you read my source I gave. It read : This percentage is above the epidemic threshold of 7.2% for week 12. They DO have a weekly threshold. Iluvalar (talk) 16:10, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
Iluvalar: Sure. I'm sorry, my message was not clear. I did not want to imply that the data does not exist for some countries. My point is that what the CDC is doing is not what the above table proposal is, for the reasons I have explained above. It was probably not a good idea to direct the comment at you in this way. --MarioGom (talk) 16:29, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
MarioGom, I'm not here to fight to death for this specific table, but I think we need more of those comparison in general in the articles, it's important to give context. Iluvalar (talk) 02:45, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

Another table

We have this in maps already. Not sure it is needed here. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:09, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Have moved here[66] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 17:15, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

Where to place the per-capita table

Total-covid-deaths-per-million
Total-confirmed-cases-of-covid-19-per-million-people

I created a separate per-capita table and put it to 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic. This was because people did not want the existing highly misleading table changed.

The table has now been moved to 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic by country and territory, which is better than nothing, but not really good enough, in my view.

To keep the table with absolute numbers without any relation to other numbers to provide meaning is bad enough; the table should ideally go. But to also remove the per-capita table from the same most often visited page is even worse.

I propose to put the per-capita table back to 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic; the unethically misleading table with absolute numbers stays since there is no consensus for its replacement with the per-capita table until people see the light and the consensus changes.

--Dan Polansky (talk) 17:59, 10 April 2020 (UTC)

IMO, the table is now in a better place 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic by country and territory--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 18:17, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
Why is that? Why is the table with absolute numbers in both locations and the table with per-capita only in a single location? --Dan Polansky (talk) 18:24, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
And before the per-capita table was removed, it was made collapsed by default by someone else, which I found kind of tolerable, while not necessarily ideal. What's going on here? Why must not the readers of one of the most visited pages on the covid in Wikipedia see the per-capita table? --Dan Polansky (talk) 18:36, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
I conditionally support bringing that table to this article — it's highly relevant information. But it needs some tweaks before it's ready for "primetime" here. Among them:
  • Convert it to an independently-hosted template, so that it can be used elsewhere too and doesn't bloat the wikitext.
  • Add all the nice formatting elements from the absolute numbers table, including the country flags, links, shading, pinning of the first row, font size, scrolling, explanatory footnotes, etc. (If you need technical help, let us know, but most should be possible just by looking at the other table and copying.)
  • Add some indication of where the data is coming from (it doesn't have to be as detailed as the absolute numbers table, but presumably it's from there and from some population database).
  • Change the default sort from alphabetic to cases. (perhaps it'll change to deaths at some point, but consensus isn't there yet.)
Once those changes are made, I'll be able to offer more full-throated support for bringing it here, and I think others will be less likely to remove it. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 18:55, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
I can do and am willing to do the above, although I think most of these reservations are rather unimportant compared to the grave problem the table solves. I need some reassurance that the table is not going to be removed (or moved elsewhere, which has the same effect) again. I am going to wait for more responses before I make any changes. --Dan Polansky (talk) 19:13, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
We already have this data in this article in these two maps. So yes I think it is reasonable to put the detail table in the subpage. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:54, 10 April 2020 (UTC)
We don't: the maps only show ranges and not the data points. The maps do not show, for instance, that the highest value is about 1000 deaths in milliom inhabitants. Why are the absolute numbers (misleading, unethical) not put to detail page given we have a map covering them? --Dan Polansky (talk) 06:24, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
I suspect many people simply don't sympathise with the political and moral claims you're advancing about tribe mentality and the like and don't feel like arguing about them, hence your table being hidden or removed. If you want to make a stable change to the page it might be more helpful to focus on value added rather than wrongs supposedly corrected—instinctively I would consider the per capita numbers derivative of the absolute numbers and fine to keep on a subpage given that we already have the map illustration. —Nizolan (talk · c.) 20:18, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
Also important to address the concerns raised here 2019–20_coronavirus_pandemic_by_country_and_territory#Pandemic_by_country_and_territory. We have no reference or dates for the content in question. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 23:30, 11 April 2020 (UTC)
I make no claims about "tribe mentality"; I make claims about human psychology evolved in a time at very different population sizes and its irrational perception of absolute death numbers. Currently, the Wikipedia presentation of the data is one of a tabloid, not of a NPOV encyclopedia. I find it obvious that presentation of absolute numbers without context is misleading and unethical. Perhaps someone could help me find sources in epidemiological literature about presentation of such figures. Meanwhile, someone could point me to a page where Wikipedia published its standard for publishing of epidemiological data, or say, a page where BBC has published its standard for publishing of epidemiological data.
As for sourcing, if there was something like conditional consensus to add the table (barring pending issues), we could find a way how to indicate that the per-capita figures are sourced from the absolute figures, and we could spend effort to find a reliable source from which to take the per-capita figures directly. --Dan Polansky (talk) 06:00, 12 April 2020 (UTC)
Let's clarify one thing. It is perfectly rational to be concerned that the case fatality rate of a virus could be as high as 2% or even more and we must hope that the actual value is going to be much lower in many regions. And it is perfectly rational to be concerned about a virus that can increase daily all-cause deaths twofold for some time in some regions. There are "rationally" scary figures, and there are irrationally scary figures. There are relevant and meaningful figures and there are misleading figures. --Dan Polansky (talk) 06:49, 12 April 2020 (UTC)
I am disinclined to engage with this further until you tone it down a bit. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:19, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

Date of origin

I don't disagree with no specified date of origin even if there is a source because the Chinese pandemic article says it started on Dec 1 and in the Epidemiology subsection, there is sentence that states the earliest person found illed on Dec 1: "The earliest known person with symptoms was later discovered to have fallen ill on 1 December 2019, and that person did not have visible connections with the later wet market cluster." So mismatch occured between the main pandemic article and the mainland China article (the outbreak spreaded). The Supermind (talk) 10:38, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

this has been discussed before Supermind--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 17:44, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
The source present was this one https://www.who.int/csr/don/12-january-2020-novel-coronavirus-china/en/
The outbreak was identified on Dec 31st per that source.
That source did not support Dec 1st. The date of the outbreak IMO should be from identification to conclusion.
Yes one can look back retrospectively but that is controversial. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:24, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

Redcat

There is a redcat, the kind that gets automatically added when something is wrong with an {{as of}} template in an article. I think it is coming from one of the transclusions in the lead (I took the lead to another page, and problem went along with it). TIA! Usedtobecool ☎️ 09:11, 12 April 2020 (UTC)

yes, it happens...--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 20:48, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 13 April 2020

Highest death rate is in Algeria with 15.78 % based on 313 deaths and 1983 confirmed cases from Wikipedia article on coronavirus by countries and territories, here's the link of Algerian ministry of health http://covid19.sante.gov.dz/carte/156.206.132.80 (talk) 20:49, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

 Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 20:55, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

data request: Statistics newinfect With weekday

weekday information. I guess it Is the shopping Friday. Give out Assignments to go to markets mo tue wd th fr sa via Regulations. Or is Friday the best and Monday worst? incubation vs weekday

Statistics daily infects globally (what is there) all countries all timeshifts Wikistallion (talk) 20:31, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

Wikistallion,  What. Could you please clarify what it is that you're looking for exactly? Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 20:38, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
More likely variation will depend on whether the testers are having a day off, so you can expect lower figures due to the weekend. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 21:17, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

Paring down overlong sections

Okay, so we currently have four sections tagged as too long, Germany, France, WHO, and Socioeconomics, each of which has had that tag for a few days. It isn't great for maintenance templates to persist in an article this prominent for that long, so let's try to get them taken care of. The latter two can be dealt with directly. The first two are excerpts. They can be dealt with either by (a) re-writing so that they have text unique to here, (b) using <noinclude>...</noinclude> at the source article to dictate what's transcluded to here, or (c) shortening where it's needed at the source article. I think (a) or (b) will be most appropriate here. Anyone want to take this on? It'll also help delay a little bit the technical limits this article is bumping up against, as mentioned above. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 08:45, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

For the France and Germany sections, I used the only include templates on the sections of their lead that were clearly talking about their domestic responses and transcluded those. For the other two, I removed content about specific countries, generally only leaving in stuff relevant globally. Thanks for teaching me about only include templates, just learned they existed :) Benica11 (talk). 01:34, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

Statistical studies

I've just modified text on a couple of sentences citing sources which contain poor statistical evidence.

  • Number one was an analysis of death rates in Nembro, Italy authored by the local mayor and published in a newspaper. This was certainly not WP:MEDRS so I removed it.
  • Number two is a preliminary analysis of infection rates in a single town in Germany, issued as a press release. The methodology has been heavily criticised [67] so it may be better to remove this sentence entirely.

I think we need to be very careful when reporting early results of statistical studies. No doubt better and more thorough work is being done and will be published in due course. Robertpedley (talk) 21:06, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

The data are said to "blunt" in a "plateau" when the test capacity finally catch up with the real figures. We can clearly see it in italy's data on march 21, where is suddenly switched from an exponential curve to a slightly decreasing one. Before that date, there was no doubt the same level of deaths without being tested. The same happened in NY according to the NYT. Is there anyone in the talk page here that disagree still with this interpretation ? Iluvalar (talk) 02:05, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

Note for Kosovo

Moved to Template talk:2019–20 coronavirus pandemic data § Note for Kosovo
 – MarioGom (talk) 14:48, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

WHO response

Under WHO response measures

December 2019

"On December 31, Taiwanese health officials warned WHO that the coronavirus is transmissible between humans, but the WHO ignored the warnings and did not notify other countries.[805]"

This information isn't sufficiently backed up. The cited article is from The Independent Sentinel titled "Reporter says WHO admits it ignored Taiwan virus warnings in December" which is mostly just a photo of 3 paragraphs of an Economist article that says Taiwan asked WHO about human-to-human transmission and the WHO admittingly never replied. The paragraphs state that WHO ignores Taiwan NOT that Taiwan warned WHO about human-to-human transmission and WHO ignored the warning and failed to notify other countries. If the latter is true a better source should be cited. — Preceding unsigned comment added by DiegoJane (talk • contribs) 05:12, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

This is apparently a full report on the matter, but it’s locked behind a paywall. (https://www.ft.com/content/2a70a02a-644a-11ea-a6cd-df28cc3c6a68) Benica11 (talk). 14:58, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
I removed the “ignored” part as other sources allege they at least considered the warning. Benica11 (talk). 15:16, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

CFRs in the lead

I am not sure this belongs in the lead

"with Italy showing the highest rate of 11.39 per cent.[1]"

The deaths in the Bahamas are greater. As is France by the way.[68] Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 03:25, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

@Doc James: The article's focus is on the pandemic, not just China. Consequently mentioning only China's CFR is inappropriate and unacceptable.
Countries such as Italy show a much higher rate of 11% than China’s 4%. I sought to introduce scope in the lead by including Italy’s which you preferred to remove. In that case, I have removed China’s as well. Painting part of a picture here rather than the whole does more harm than good.
The sentence has been edited to simply read; ‘Case fatality rates vary significantly between countries.’ Veritycheck✔️ (talk) 12:47, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
Sure seems reasonable. If we mention any rate it should be the global one. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 18:22, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ Henriques, Martha. "Coronavirus: Why death and mortality rates differ". www.bbc.com. Retrieved 13 April 2020.

Semi-protected edit request on 14 April 2020

Add image:

File:Flatten the curve by social distancing

Social distancing and self-isolation may reduce transmission of COVID-19 but not completely. PrimaryHealth (talk) 05:54, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

 Not done. The specified image does not appear to exist. Boing! said Zebedee (talk) 19:31, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

Greenland

If Greenland have all people recovered from COVID-19 then can it go away from the chart? Hi poland (talk) 08:00, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

Hi poland, what source is that from? We're using Worldometers and that says there are currently 770 active cases. Could you elaborate? — Yours, Bᴇʀʀᴇʟʏ • Talk∕Contribs 14:23, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
Greenland has all people recovered. The numbers you pulled are for Iceland. As for the original question, I’d keep Greenland in. Articles on other epidemics keep the national case counts in well after the epidemic’s conclusion and there’s always the possibility the cases come back. Benica11 (talk). 14:33, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
The larger question of how to represent the pandemic data/maps once it becomes more of a past thing is a good thing for us to start considering, as it will (hopefully) be increasingly relevant soon. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 20:35, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 13 April 2020

Change Greece's color on main map from 50-200 cases per mil to 200-500 cases per mil (current Greece status; 203 cases per mil). NicolasMartell96 (talk) 10:32, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

 Already done, the map maker fixed it a few hours ago Benica11 (talk). 00:46, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

Very insignificant change

In the infobox, it says "territories". Wouldn't it be better to have it listed as "territories affcted"? Kika.txt (talk) 03:49, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

Kika.txt, "affected" is implied. We don't need any unnecessary words to clutter the infobox. —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 05:04, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

worth mention?

I don't see how this belongs in the main article on the pandemic, considering there's little evidence of relevance to the pandemic. At best, maybe it belongs in the article for the US, but even that seems a stretch. If there was some evidence the virus came from the labs then maybe it would belong somewhere but there isn't. Nil Einne (talk) 22:53, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
The Epidemiology section of the article already list that it came from bats and there were some in the open food market in Wuhan. Why not mention bats known to have this virus were being researched in a research facility in the city as well, and that American had warned China for years about the threat of this happening? Dream Focus 01:01, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
Because it's speculation, with overtones of My country is better than your country. HiLo48 (talk) 02:48, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
  • It is no more speculation than people who said the bats with the virus came from the open food market. And how exactly do you interpret it as "my country is better than your country"? No idea how you reading that into thinks. I doubt anyone in China would argue that America is way better than their country though and they'd move here if they could. Dream Focus 04:02, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
Does not relate to the pandemic really so not on this page. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 03:11, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
How does American warning them about the pandemic before it happened not relate to this pandemic? This is EXACTLY what they said would happen. Dream Focus 04:01, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
America didn't warn about the pandemic. They warned about safety risks from a lab, which from the current evidence, has nothing to do with the pandemic. And speculation about possible origins from of this outbreak from the wet market, and it's ultimate origins in bats with the possibility of pangolins as an intermediatary has been widely discussion in reliable secondary sources including academic ones. It's somewhat true that the wet market origins have come into question with some more recent data, so it's possible that this should be removed from this article although because of the significance of the wet market in terms of the first known identified cluster, it's quite likely it will be mentioned here even if we don't comment on it originating from there. And this still has enough significance for coverage in other articles (the virus one definitely and probably the disease one too).
Meanwhile, there are few reliable sources which speculate about this may originate from that particular research lab. Even in terms of the above 2 sources, I'll note the claims about it originating from that particular lab are limited. National Review quotes one unnamed official as claiming the evidence is in favour of it originating from the label. The expertise of this official is unknown.
Washington Post claims "national security officials have long suspected" it originated from a lab, but they apparently can't even decide which lab and aren't willing to publicly provide their evidence, and the expertise of these officials in the matter is unclear. In fact, it's not even clear if these are career bureaucrats, or political appointees.
It also quotes one person who they actually name, but who's expertise is also unclear (he is working at a School of Information so I'm not sure he is an epidemiologist). And even if we put this aside, he doesn't really seem willing to say it originated from that particular lab. Instead all he really says is we don't know enough, we need to know more and so the Chinese government needs to be transparent and it could have originated from a lab although not as an engineered virus. Most likely this is because whatever his expertise he is a scientist and so he recognises the actual public evidence at the moment that it originated from that particular lab is very limited.
BTW who is "them" in the above comment? America seems to have warned American officials. It was a "sensitive but unclassified" cable between Americans. I guess it's possible China got access to it, but it clearly wasn't targeted at them. From those sources, it's not clear that the US actually contacted China or anyone about their concerns. They sent officials to visit, which is in part how these cables came about but whether these officials ever shared their concerns directly with anyone in China isn't stated. In fact, the Washington Post notes that the Chinese had asked for more help from the US but it's unclear if this was provided.
Nil Einne (talk) 09:35, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

Need a reliable government source for the United States data in the

CLOSED
Duplicated: Template talk:2019–20 coronavirus pandemic data § Need a reliable government source for the United States. --MarioGom (talk) 13:37, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The infobox template listing countries data is hugely consequential since Google pulls from it when someone searches for 'covid-19 deaths' or something similar.

It is using a hugely unreliable source for the United States data.

The United States data is supplied by this website: https://coronavirus.1point3acres.com/en which states that .

The main webpage is in Chinese https://www.1point3acres.com/ which claims to be a "media-based tracker"

Following through its links you get to a medium blog post here: https://medium.com/1point3acres/about which confirms that, apparently, the site is run by Peter Sun, an undergraduate student at Duke.

Its inconsistencies are clear - the homepage claims its "media-based" but the tracker that the wikipedia page is actually linked to lists the United States Center for Disease Control (CDC) as the source of its data (here: https://coronavirus.1point3acres.com/en scroll down).

Clicking on the CDC link takes you only to the CDC's homepage.

If you actually go to the CDC's official count, their cases are significantly different

As of 5:47am EST April 15:

https://coronavirus.1point3acres.com/en count is 26,114 CDC official count is 22,252 (Source: https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/cases-in-us.html )

This is a huge discrepancy.

We should not allow a totally unverified webpage run by an individual take this prominence over a government source on one of the most important wikipedia entries. While Peter Sun's page includes both US and Canadian data it is only being used for the US data on wikipedia - Canada's data is CTV News which is a comparatively reliable source.

I therefore propose that the numbers and source are immediately corrected to the CDC official government page, which is what Peter Sun cites on his page for his United States level statistics, so he should not have grounds to object. N0thingbetter (talk) 10:09, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Thanks, folks!

Not a forum, no need to reply. —moonythedwarf (Braden N.) 20:25, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Yes, I'm aware of WP:NOTFORUM, but I feel this is the best place to say this, so maybe make an exception just this once?

Thank you to everyone who has worked to make Wikipedia one of the best places to get information on the pandemic, going over every detail, singling out misinformation, and providing the world with knowledge that is incredibly important during these times. To everyone who has worked on the Coronavirus Pandemic articles, everyone from the biggest contributor to the person who made a single minor edit to fix a typo: Thank you so much for helping keep the world safe. This article is of unimaginable importance, and doing it well is vital. Thank you for not just doing it well, but having a quality standard above nearly everyone's expectations.

Thanks you all. —moonythedwarf (Braden N.) 20:21, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

"Covidiot" listed at Redirects for discussion

An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect Covidiot. Please participate in the redirect discussion if you wish to do so. signed, Rosguill talk 20:37, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

Suggestion for Map

I think it would be a good idea for the map at the beginning of the article to have a higher category than just 1000+ cases, because then there is no distinction between 1,000 and 100,000 cases. ItsDaBunnyYT (talk) 21:28, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

But the map colours are per million inhabitants (eg. 1000 cases/million inhabitants). best, 81.107.215.246 (talk) 21:47, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

NATO

Why would one count NATO on the list of sovereign territories ? Makes no sense. Please remove it, and leave as before. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.52.24.15 (talk • contribs) 22:01, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

Notable deaths?

Should deaths of notable (celebrities, etc) people, such as Rick May, be listed on this page? Mount2010 (talk) 20:39, 14 April 2020 (UTC)

I've withdrawn support to be listed on this page as they can be listed here instead. N.B. That page looks like it should be renamed. Veritycheck✔️ (talk) 20:23, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

China's numbers

I noticed that when one hovers over "Iran" in the table of cases, deaths etc. by country there is this note:

2. Non-official sources inside and outside Iran report significantly higher numbers of infected and dead.[66][67][68][69]

If that's worthy of being noted, should there not also be a note on the implausibility of China's numbers? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 120.88.167.206 (talk • contribs)

What legislator in the National People's Congress has claimed 50 dead in Qom alone? Our official numbers claim (see Template:2019–20 coronavirus pandemic data/Iran medical cases chart) 12 deaths in the entire republic the day that legislator's claim was made. CaradhrasAiguo (leave language) 00:24, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
@CaradhrasAiguo: I'm not aware of any Chinese lawmaker admitting to something similar. Does that matter? If, hypothetically, the numbers were false, would it be expected that they would admit that? Only 1 of the 4 sources linked in the cases/deaths table re: Iran's numbers refers to the aforementioned Iranian legislator, while the rest refer to foreign speculation/deduction/common sense. With the abundance of grounds for reasonable doubt, and the fact that, in light of the rest-of-the-world's experience, the Chinese numbers are absurd on their face, how is the slight possibility of falsification not noted? Moreover, I noticed, per Talk Archive 12, that you removed a mention of the abnormal fit to a quadratic in the early stages of the outbreak. Do you have a horse in this race? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 120.88.167.206 (talk • contribs)
Your ping does not work since your comment was unsigned Your "own horse" passive aggressive remark is by itself an indication of absence of good faith.
Responding to your abnormal fit to a quadratic claim (which is the only remotely substantive remark you made), the cited paper that Piper42 added is explicitly quoted in the abstract as Contrary to the usual exponential growth, a quadratic growth is the result of control interventions. It can be explained by spreading on the periphery of a bulk structure, which can be geometrical or sociological nature. Nothing about massaged statistics there.
And suppose there was widespread doctoring of statistics. Even the paper I linked to re: quadratic growth is examining cumulative confirmed cases and fatalities, which is of no use, see this discussion on Barron's pretense of a non-analysis. CaradhrasAiguo (leave language) 03:53, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

Reliability of coronavirus.1point3acres.com - US figures

I read why you are using this third party source, but is there any accountability? Who decided that it's reliable ? Read the disclaimer at the bottom of their website. Is Wikipedia promoting https://coronavirus.1point3acres.com/en ? CDC is a government agency and is therefore accountable but 1p3a... // Eatcha (talk) 08:37, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

Eatcha, please refer to this discussion if you haven't read it. The tl;dr of it is the CDC hasn't been able to keep up with the number of cases reported, hence why we've switched to using 1point3acres. —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 15:44, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

remove unused references

<ref name=":7">{{cite web |url=https://www.chp.gov.hk/en/features/102465.html |title=Severe Respiratory Disease associated with a Novel Infectious Agent |publisher=Government of Hong Kong |access-date=1 February 2020}}</ref> [1]

<ref name=":8">{{cite web |url=https://www.moh.gov.sg/2019-ncov-wuhan |title=Updates on Wuhan Coronavirus (2019-nCoV) Local Situation |work=MoH.gov.sg |publisher=[[Ministry of Health of Singapore]] |access-date=1 February 2020}}</ref> [2] Randomuser9327 (talk) 08:02, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

Randomuser9327,  Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format. —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 15:36, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
 Done; it's clear enough to me that the user was suggesting we remove two references from the list at the bottom of the article which are not used in the body; I removed them, and also two others which were similarly unused. :) -sche (talk) 17:42, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ "Severe Respiratory Disease associated with a Novel Infectious Agent". Government of Hong Kong. Retrieved 1 February 2020.
  2. ^ "Updates on Wuhan Coronavirus (2019-nCoV) Local Situation". MoH.gov.sg. Ministry of Health of Singapore. Retrieved 1 February 2020.

"Outbreak" is not a synonym of "pandemic"

So, why are the two words used interchangeably? For example, the article reads: "The peak and ultimate duration of the outbreak are uncertain and may differ by location."

An outbreak is a sudden occurrence of something unwelcome, such as war or disease. So an outbreak of a pandemic is not a pandemic itself. 85.193.250.200 (talk) 12:39, 15 April 2020 (UTC)

Locally you have outbreaks.
Globally you have a pandemic.
IMHO. Yug (talk) 15:23, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
@Yug It's like saying: "Locally you have flames. Globally you have a conflagration." But what if we know that only one flame started a conflagration, not millions of them? 85.193.250.200 (talk) 17:45, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
This article used to be called "outbreak" rather than "pandemic", because WHO had not yet called it a pandemic. There were big title discussions (and right now there's a moratorium on further name changes; see the list of consensus pages at the top of this talk page) and eventually the name became "pandemic". It's possible that some wording has remained from before the name change. Careful fixes to make the usage correct and consistent between local outbreaks of the pandemic and the pandemic as a whole would most likely be accepted uncontroversially. Propose them here first if you're unsure. Boud (talk) 16:15, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
@Boud A very sensible approach. Unfortunately, I am too busy to do so. But thanks for such a painstaking analysis. Hopefully somebody will do something about it. 85.193.250.200 (talk) 18:00, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
A pandemic is a type of outbreak. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 16:42, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
@User:Doc James A pandemic is a type of outbreak like a conflagration is a type of a flame. 85.193.250.200 (talk) 17:45, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
Yes a conflagration is a type of fire. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:36, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
@User:Doc James ... but not a type of a flame. I mean a single small flame that starts a chain reaction. A pandemic is like a conflagration, and an outbreak is like a single flame - the analogy is obvious. In both cases positive feedback leads to a self-amplifying chain of events. English, like any other natural language, is inconsistent and illogical, which applies also to grammar. But whenever we have a choice, we should choose the best option, especially here - in Wikipedia. 85.193.250.200 (talk) 20:39, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
An outbreak is like a fire not a flame. A flame is like a single case. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 20:47, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
@User:Doc James You use the word "fire" which is very ambiguous, and can mean also a conflagration. As for "a single case" - of course "a flame is like a single case". You are right! But keep in mind that "a single case" can trigger a chain reaction, which in epidemiology is called "outbreak". Do you see that you contradict yourself? 85.193.250.200 (talk) 21:35, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
Agreed with Doc James. It's useful to have more than one word available to refer to the pandemic for language variation. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 22:40, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
@User:Sdkb Language variation at the expense of accuracy and readability? 85.193.250.200 (talk) 17:45, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
@85.193.250.200 - I also get your point and what should have been a clear analogy. Usage of outbreak had a place, no doubt, at the onset of the virus and in the initial stage of this article. That time has passed as we see the progression to pandemic. In deed, the two words are not synonymous. @User:Doc James - As you don’t seem to see the difference between ‘where’ and ‘were’ as demonstrated by one of your previous edits combined with your admittance on your talk page, ‘P.S. My spelling and grammar are poor, so thank you for correcting them.’ – you might want to bow out on this one. Thanking me is optional of course! Veritycheck✔️ (talk) 20:06, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
I did not claim the two are the same. I said one is a type of the other. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 20:12, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
@User:Veritycheck Thank you for your support:-) 85.193.250.200 (talk) 21:52, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

International conveyances

Hi! In 'International conveyances' some of them are national: f.e., Charles de Gaulle is 100% from France and USS Theodore Roosevelt is 100% from USA. National flags are required. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.171.172.131 (talk) 10:51, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

thank you for suggestion--Ozzie10aaaa (talk) 01:12, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

WP:PEIS - proposals for WP:SPLITting some content needed

This article has once against hit the post-expand include size software limits. In the rendered source I see #invoke:Navbox with collapsible groups instead of the expanded COVID-19 template, which means that as a fallback, the software decided not to expand the COVID-19 template. Looking at the source (Ctrl-u in firefox) shows "postexpandincludesize":{"value":2095097,"limit":2097152} at the bottom, so that without the COVID-19 template, the post-expand-include-size (PEIS) is just a tiny bit under the limit. 2000 more characters of templated material would hit the limit again.

So once again (this happened before - search the archives), some material - with a fair amount of template usage - needs to be WP:SPLIT off. Boud (talk) 18:36, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

I think the recent addition of two new sections by John Cummings may be what pushed it over the limit. I think those sections are mostly unwarranted, so I'm going to start a thread just below asking that they be sharply reduced. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 18:45, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
  • Removing {{2019–20 coronavirus pandemic data}} on a sandbox gets me down to "postexpandincludesize":{"value":1712316,"limit":2097152}. However, I suspect that removing the main per-territory-cases-deaths table would be strongly opposed, and much less likely to gain consensus than removing those two new sections - which are clearly important, but there are many important subtopics, and they are new; not all subtoics can be included, and new ones would have to gain consensus to push out old ones.
  • I tried removing the whole Impact section and got only a tiny reduction in the PEIS.
  • The Xenophobia section looks a bit overcited - removing the least important refs there might help a bit, though I didn't check the numerical effect.
I suspect that many small careful edits that remove a small number of the least vital references, throughout the article, will be needed, if the problem is not to recur. Or else watchers should keep an eye on any major additions of content and react faster. Boud (talk) 19:30, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
I think moving {{2019–20 coronavirus pandemic data}} to 2019–20 coronavirus pandemic by country and territory is probably going to be a good idea at some point. I have tried to remove as many excessive citations as I could, and the article seemed to be displaying in its entirety after that. One thing I would suggest is looking for "comprehensive" sources that can be used to cite many sentences that currently have individual (separate) sources. -sche (talk) 04:59, 17 April 2020 (UTC)
Boud, since lede sections are supposed to be summarising the rest of the article, perhaps we can get rid of some {{cite}} templates by removing all of the references in there? Otherwise we may want to start thinking about splitting the article by sections. Responses (domestic and international) could probably make up an article by itself, —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 05:10, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

Updated deaths in China

It's now 4632 deaths according to worldometers.[1]

We don't use WorldOMeters anymore. —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 15:29, 17 April 2020 (UTC)


References

  1. ^ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/china/

China death-to-case ratio

"In China, estimates for the death-to-case ratio decreased from 17.3 per cent (for those with onset of symptoms from 1 to 10 January 2020) to 0.7 per cent (for those with onset of symptoms after 1 February 2020)." (citation)

The above sentence was deleted and then restored some time ago. I'd like to delete it again... Early on, this statistic sounded very promising and it was widely cited. Now it sounds unlikely or at least irrelevant given more recent data. The world average death-to-case ratio above 6%. Even assuming that the data was accurate at that point in time, this crude fatality ratio accounts only for patients with symptom onset within the prior 19 days. The mean time to death is 18 days. Even in South Korea, where testing is very broad, they've only achieved a D/C ratio of 2.1%. - Wikmoz (talk) 02:33, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

As someone who has been disappointed with how the WHO (and Tedros in particular) have handled things, I'd consider it unreliable, with a few sources also questioning the issue of how China is fudging its numbers.[1][2] —Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝 ) 02:44, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
I don't see anomalies here at all, China tested their population at large they shared valuable data, they only have 2% of their population over 70, italy have 11% over 70, their case fatality rate is proportional. Also, thx to this early study, no other country really bother testing youngers ever since, which inflate every other countries CFR. Iluvalar (talk) 17:23, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
I see an anomaly. However, even assuming the data is accurate, it's still incomplete as the ratio would have been recorded before at least half of possible deaths in the sample set would have been recorded. I'm not sure why the WHO would even report the number unless they thought the time-to-death was significantly shorter than what we now know it to be. - Wikmoz (talk) 03:24, 17 April 2020 (UTC)
Based on the above issue and today's revision to China's official death toll, I've removed the sentence. - Wikmoz (talk) 18:01, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

References

  1. ^ "Coronavirus: Why China's claims of success raise eyebrows". BBC News. 7 April 2020. Archived from the original on 8 April 2020. Retrieved 15 April 2020.
  2. ^ "The US intelligence community has reportedly concluded that China intentionally misrepresented its coronavirus numbers". 1 April 2020. Archived from the original on 1 April 2020. Retrieved 15 April 2020.

New sections on sex and domestic violence

@John Cummings: you just added two new sections, one on the impact of the pandemic on domestic violence, and one on the differing medical impact of the virus by sex. Per WP:DUE, I think we can fit only maybe two sentences on domestic violence in an article this high-level, and not as a separate section. For the section on sex, I think we'd be able to fit more at Coronavirus disease 2019, but again, here there can be a sentence or two at most, and not a separate section. Would you be willing to make those changes yourself? If not, I expect someone else here may need to; there just isn't room (in either a technical or editorial sense). {{u|Sdkb}} talk 18:44, 16 April 2020 (UTC)

Much (or all?) of the "sex differences" section arguably pertains to the disease, not the pandemic, and could (and under these circumstances, should) be moved to the article on the disease (or virus?). -sche (talk) 22:40, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
I've moved the "sex" section to Coronavirus disease 2019. -sche (talk) 22:45, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
Broader question here - how far down the tree of cause and effect should this page go?
  • 1) Virus makes people get sick and die
  • 2) Because people get sick and die, some governments (not all!) impose lockdown. There are other effects at this stage, like impact on healthcare, mortuaries, care homes, transport systems, panic shopping, cease-fire in Idlib, increase in deaths for other causes because people don't want to go to hospital.
  • 3) Because of lockdown, there is increased domestic violence. There's also an increase in home schooling, reduction in routine vaccinations like measles, closure of workplaces, increase in flytipping, Amazon & Zoom shares increase in value, reduction in seasonal colds and flu, reduction in opportunistic crime .... the list goes on and on.
Sad to say, domestic violence is just a very small part of the overall picture, and it's only been documented roughly in a small number of countries. We can't justify a whole section devoted to it here. Propose to move to Socio-economic effects.
Robertpedley (talk) 09:34, 17 April 2020 (UTC)
@Robertpedley: The socioeconomic effects article seems like a good place for it. Regarding your broader question, I'd say it's a know-it-when-you-see-it kinda thing, but we shouldn't be afraid to include areas where a direct connection can be demonstrated. This is the pandemic article, not the disease article. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 19:12, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

"Condemic" listed at Redirects for discussion

An editor has asked for a discussion to address the redirect Condemic. Please participate in the redirect discussion if you wish to do so. signed, Rosguill talk 19:32, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

hydroxychloroquine ?

it's irresponsible not to mention treatment with hydroxychloroquine— Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:283:4880:a5e0:3507:58a2:6ed5:97f6 (talk • contribs)

How so? --McSly (talk) 12:04, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
Seemingly ineffective. No evidence of clinical efficacy of hydroxychloroquine in patients hospitalised for COVID-19 infection and requiring oxygen: results of a study using routinely collected data to emulate a target trial Robertpedley (talk) 13:56, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
Given the extensive coverage of Hydroxychloroquine in relation to the outbreak, speculation on its efficacy, and attempts to prescribe it in various locales, it is probably worthwhile mention it in the article. Possibly alongside other drugs that received such attention.--Eostrix (talk) 14:08, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
I guess we could say evidence does not currently support a benefit. Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 19:36, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
There is evidence about its potential benefits, and it is clearly now being used in several places. An updated section on this would be helpful information on whether it is useful or not. ForzaItalia2020 (talk) 20:34, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
ForzaItalia2020, what evidence? Anecdotes are not evidence. We need randomized clinical trials. – Muboshgu (talk) 20:39, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
We had a mention of hcq and some other drugs, a couple of weeks ago, under "Treatment". Currently it says "Several compounds...." which seems OK to me. No evidential need to highlight hcq, it's just getting a lot of unwarranted publicity. Full list here Coronavirus Disease 2019 Treatment: A Review of Early and Emerging Options Robertpedley (talk) 21:07, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
Muboshgu, if there is no evidence of potential benefits, then that should be clarified. My point is that it is getting publicity and some people may think it is effective, rightly or wrongly. I think information on whether it is or isnt't is pertinent and useful for people to have. ForzaItalia2020 (talk) 21:11, 16 April 2020 (UTC)
ForzaItalia2020 Are there any other unfounded rumours we should tackle while we're at it? Robertpedley (talk) 10:35, 17 April 2020 (UTC)
Would someone looking for information on chloroquine/hydroxychloroquine in relation to COVID-19 find it in the obvious places?
So the answer is yes: we do mention it in the obvious places. Can/should we compress the full four paragraphs at COVID-19 drug development#Hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine into a single short phrase and extend one of the sentences in the main article without making it too detailed or violating WP:UNDUE? Maybe the sentence Remdesivir appears to be the most promising.[117] could be extended to something like "Remdesivir appears to be the most promising,[117] while hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine, which have a high risk of lethal overdose[ref] and as of 17 April 2020 have no clinical evidence in favour of their usage for COVID-19, gained significant media attention.[ref]" Boud (talk) 20:28, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

Deaths UK

When I look at the UK page it lists deaths from hospital figures AND in one place deaths on death certificates. I realise that each country has different ways of accounting. BUT in the case on this page it is a total to date - should these extra 6000 or so deaths also be included with a footnote. I have not done that as it would be quite contentious due to the implications of total numbers. But it would make sense to include all deaths - if not why not?

We generally include confirmed cases per World Health Organization definition and confirmed deaths. For countries that report suspected cases, you may find them in their article, like 2020 coronavirus pandemic in New Zealand. --MarioGom (talk) 20:41, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

Dealing with technical limitations of WP:PEIS

Ahecht has raised the issue we were noticing the other day of reference tooltips not being displayed because of WP:PEIS. I'm opening this conversation to explore what our options are to deal with this, and would be curious to hear from those with more technical expertise. Is there any way to increase the limit? {{u|Sdkb}} talk 00:13, 13 April 2020 (UTC)

When a page reaches the template limit, the most common solution is to convert some "citation templates" to a "manual style" citation as this has ZERO effect for our readers...templates for refs are just an editor preferences...thus not an end user concern.

Rawls, John (1971). [http://books.google.com/books?id=kvpby7HtAe0C&pg=PA1 ''A Theory of Justice'']. Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0-674-00078-0

--Moxy 🍁 00:23, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
+1, go for it. I just reduced all the duplicate citations I could find, but that seems to have had no effect on the fact that the last few references in the article are displaying as "#invoke:citation/CS1" and the like. (I am not sure if this is because of PEIS issues or something else.) -sche (talk) 02:18, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
This was discussed at WP:VPT (permalink). Since then, the large navboxes have been removed and I don't think there is any more low-hanging fruit. I just did some tests for the post‐expand include size:
  • Current article is slightly broken and uses 2,097,152 bytes (the limit).
  • The only navbox is {{2019–20 coronavirus pandemic|short=true}} which uses 49,360 bytes.
  • Removing the navbox makes the article just work (the result is slightly under the limit but it would soon go over as more templates are added).
  • There are currently 359 {{cite xxx}} templates in the References section (and many more in the article). Removing the 359 templates saved 562,000 bytes.
Expanding the cites would be really ugly as it would make editing the citations very difficult. In principle, the cites could be put in another page and a gnome would expand them and put the expansion in the article (keeping the original cite on the other page). However, that would break down in a couple of hours with the hectic editing. The solution might be a creative split of the article. Johnuniq (talk) 02:24, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
Another possible solution has been done in Timeline of the 2019-20 coronavirus pandemic in March 2020, where we split off a major section (Responses to the 2019-20 coronavirus pandemic in March 2020) into its own article after this same issue occurred over there. Tenryuu 🐲 ( 💬 • 📝) 04:00, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
Looks like we've gotten the article nearly working again, but the lack of low-hanging fruit, as Johnuniq put it, concerns me, since the pandemic is far from over, and there will be legitimate reasons to want to continue to expand some areas of it. If we don't find a more permanent solution, we're going to keep on running up against this and have to take increasingly drastic measures. Splitting doesn't seem editorially like the right move — this is a single discreet topic, and most sections, with a few exceptions, have been kept to a reasonable length. What would need to be done to get this page to have an exemption from the technical limit? {{u|Sdkb}} talk 04:07, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
That's not possible. Of course in theory anything is possible, but it's not going to happen. For one thing, editing the article takes many seconds to preview or save. That pain would be fixed if the expansion was drastically cut down. Johnuniq (talk) 09:17, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
I think rather than a hard split, a better approach would be to simply replace most of the excerpted sections with links to the source articles, using {{main}} or something similar. There's no need to duplicate content, especially when the page is already so large and unwieldy to read (trying to read it on my old netbook, for example, locks up the browser). --Ahecht (TALK
PAGE) 14:21, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
This is a little unorthodox, but throwing it out since we're in an unorthodox situation: would autocollapsing some sections help with the issue, or do they need to be totally removed from the page? If we do need to do that, I think the section on domestic responses is the most obvious candidate. But it's not as though it's disposable — Ahecht, the sections that are excerpts don't correlate with which ones are less important so much as just which ones have good or appropriately sized leads. Spain is but China isn't. Misinformation is but xenophobia isn't. Etc. It would be a disservice to readers in my view not to include information they would expect, and it might be hard as editors to agree on what to take out when, in a strictly editorial sense, none of it needs to be taken out (except the bloated content I list in the thread below). {{u|Sdkb}} talk 18:09, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
Because the current situation is very fluid, sometimes people add new information without size considerations. Once the situation stabilizes more or less, we may figure out what could be harshly trimmed to alleviate the article and what could be kept. Ultimately, this should keep the article within WP:PEIS limits. Brandmeistertalk 19:06, 13 April 2020 (UTC)
Collapsing won't help because that happens in the client's browser: the server still has to render the whole page. Johnuniq (talk) 09:22, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
Do we know what exactly is taking up so much of the room data-wise? I mean, this is a long article, but I've seen plenty of other long articles that seem a lot longer but aren't running up against the technical limit. I'm somewhat at a loss, since I just don't know what could be further removed. We're under the limit right now, thanks to Benica11's slimming of some of the overlong sections, among other edits, but I'm not sure we'll stay under for long. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 20:32, 14 April 2020 (UTC)
See "Removing the 359 templates saved 562,000 bytes" above. I'm afraid the cite templates generate a lot of stuff, and that appears to be the limit. Currently, the article is 25,000 bytes below the limit. Johnuniq (talk) 04:04, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
  • To help in pruning the article, I have promoted the {{section sizes}} template above. I reckon the Domestic_responses section which contains country-by-country details should be split off completely. It's a pandemic so every country in the world is affected and so this page should focus on overall global coverage. Another thing I notice is that the lead has about 40 citations and some of these are clusters. This looks like over citing. Andrew🐉(talk) 09:30, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
    As an editorial matter, I've advocated for significant slimming of the domestic responses section, and I think that could go significantly further (that's already in progress with the transition from countries to continents), but I'd oppose complete removal of it. This article needs to tell, for instance, the broad strokes of the history of the pandemic, and you can't do that without specifically talking about China for a bit. {{u|Sdkb}} talk 23:01, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
    It's definitely possible to trim. As Sdkb proposes, domestic reactions can be cut down a bit. The United States section is disproportionately long and some details fade away in significance as time passes. A quick example: On 23 March, it was reported that New York City had 10,700 cases of the coronavirus, more than the total number of cases in South Korea. More than total of South Korea? So what? Yes, the source mentions it, but it's inane word filling. --MarioGom (talk) 23:46, 15 April 2020 (UTC)
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