Good Question: What Do The Amount Of COVID-19 Cases Really Tell Us?
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- As of Tuesday morning, the state of Minnesota had 262 confirmed cases of COVID-19.
So, what do these numbers tell us? And, what don't they? Good Questions.
"We really do believe we're seeing much more transmission than what our numbers are actually showing," said Kris Ehresmann, the head of infectious diseases at the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH). "COVID-19 is circulating in all of our communities."
Ehresmann said there are several reasons MDH says everyone should assume COVID-19 is in their community.
First, Minnesota's initial cases were travel-related. Now, there are an increasing number of people whose only exposure was being in their community. Those confirmed cases don't know how they got the virus.
Second, healthcare providers are seeing a jump in flu-like symptoms across the state, as the number of confirmed influenza cases has dropped.
"It was starting to go down and now it's going back up again," Ehresmann said. "That suggests to us that it's related to COVID."
Third, Ehresmann said early data from China showed the actual infections could ten times the testing rate. Here in the United States, where there's been limited testing capacity, she expects that rate to be higher. She estimated Minnesota's cases number in the thousands.
"If we're using tenfold, it would be 2600 cases, if you used 100 fold, you'd be at 26,000 cases, I think we're probably somewhere in the middle of that," she said.
Until there's a good treatment or vaccine, Gov. Walz cues data that COVID-19 could infect between 40 percent and 80 percent of Minnesotans.
Ehresmann said that's because unlike influenza, where between five and twenty percent of people get influenza each year, the population has no immunity to COVID-19.
"The goal is to slow that down as much as possible until we have a vaccine or treatment," she said.
MDH and University of Minnesota researchers have spent the last week creating models on how quickly the virus will spread. Gov. Walz has asked them to determine when Minnesota will peak and when it'll reach the capacity on intensive care unit beds.
He expects to release those timelines by this weekend.