What’s more deadly – the flu, SARS or the new coronavirus discovered in China?
There are different ways to look at it and even knowledgeable folks sometimes say “deadly” when they may mean “lethal.”
Lethality means the capacity to cause death, or how often a disease proves fatal.
(MORE: Hamilton County health officials: Flu is much bigger concern than coronavirus)
Chinese scientists who looked at nearly 45,000 confirmed cases in the current COVID-19 outbreak concluded the death rate was 2.3%. But there are questions about whether all cases are being counted: Infected people with only mild symptoms may be missing from the tally. That means the true fatality rate may be lower.