<<My next puzzlement is how the Covid-19 hospitalization and death rate compares to the normal flu.>>
here are some flu stats from WebMD. You can do comp math to your liking - there are a number of ways to do comparisons. Sorry it's not a better source, but this is a nice concise summary and the numbers should be approximately OK
IMO, any risk assessment should take into account the chronic health issues that are being reported. I'm less concerned about dying from this than I am about suffering long term, or perhaps even permanent, symptoms /organ damage.
To be crystal clear, thus far chronic health issues are being observed in a very small percentage of the recovered population. However, they are being observed even in people who had mild illness. It does beg the question as to how many more may have damage that they don't yet know about.
Here's a new development that should keep the hypervigilant awake at night.
