> Even if prevalence per case is the same as flu; covid would still at least double the overall societal prevalence due to it being in addition to flu.
This sounds true if you don’t think long and hard about it, but actually the mechanics of viral spread are not quite that simple. For example there’s the phenomenom of interferon-mediated “viral interference” where infection with virus X wards off infection from virus Y (say, the influenza strain de jeur), which is thought to be attributable to acute upregulation of the innate immune system.
This sounds true if you don’t think long and hard about it, but actually the mechanics of viral spread are not quite that simple. For example there’s the phenomenom of interferon-mediated “viral interference” where infection with virus X wards off infection from virus Y (say, the influenza strain de jeur), which is thought to be attributable to acute upregulation of the innate immune system.
So, it’s not always quite so simple.