Last week The Lancet published a new study examining the case and infection fatality ratios for the pandemic. The case fatality ratio is an estimate of the fraction of people that have been confirmed to have the disease that end up passing away. The infection fatality ratio on the other hand is the fraction of people that pass away that have been infected with the virus (the infection fatality ratio includes asymptomatic cases).
The author’s best estimate of the case fatality ratio is 1.38%. Of course, there’s a big difference in the case fatality ratio by age. The ratio was a lot bigger in older age groups, with a CFR of 13% among people aged 80 years or older. Their estimated overall infection fatality ratio is 0.66%, also with an increasing profile with age.
