Putting the COVID-19 Pandemic into Perspective

While we are all being told to fear the worst, a brief look at statistics provide by Health Canada, the Canadian government's health ministry, that would suggest that we should sit back and put the current situation into context.

Here is a graph showing the daily number of new confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Canada:

While the data may be late in arriving from provincial sources, it is interesting to note that there is a significant drop in the number of new cases since the end of March.

Here is a graphic showing the total number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 for each province and territory along with the total number of infections:

Now, let's look at the normal seasonal influenza statistics.  Here is a graph showing the rise and fall of positive influenza tests over the 2019 - 2020 influenza season in Canada from the latest government FluWatch release (week 13):

Here is a table showing the cumulative number of positive influenza specimens:

As it stands now, Canada has 18,447 positive COVID-19 tests and 42,355 positive seasonal influenza tests.  Canada has a long way to go before the number of positive COVID-19 tests equals the number of positive seasonal influenza tests.

Given that Canada's Minister of Health who is driving the Canadian government's response to COVID-19 (along with the Chief Public Health Officer)  has these qualifications:

...Canadians can count on being under lockdown for the long term no matter what the statistics may say.

I will let you digest this information but please keep in mind that, at this point in time, there is not enough data to draw conclusions about the mortality rate of COVID-19 when the entire population is considered no matter what the government or media may want us to believe.