> Yes you were. In your first comment you said "Nearly all of us catch at least one cold a year, mostly during the winter months. There are, quite literally, hundreds of millions of colds a year." Those are numbers in a normal cold year. This isn't a normal cold year.
You can divide the number by any factor you want, but there are still ~6x the number of viruses out there causing colds. Even now.
>there are still ~6x the number of viruses out there causing colds
The variety of viruses is totally irrelevant to the original question of what are one's odds of having COVID based on having cold symptoms. The only piece of information that matters for that are the aggregate numbers and aggregate numbers from previous years are misleading.
> The variety of viruses is totally irrelevant to the original question of what are one's odds of having COVID based on having cold symptoms.
It is an essential factor, unless you make the (implausible) assumption that we have essentially eliminated all other respiratory viruses except for SARS-CoV2.
I like how you cutoff the my quote at the exact point that shows you how you are wrong. As I said "The only piece of information that matters for that are the aggregate numbers".
Whether there is 1 version, 6 different versions, or 1 million different versions of colds is irrelevant to your odds of having COVID when you show symptoms. What matters is whether there is 1 person, 6 people, or 1 million people with colds. The variety is meaningless. What matters is the aggregate number of cases.
> The variety of viruses is totally irrelevant to the original question of what are one's odds of having COVID based on having cold symptoms. The only piece of information that matters for that are the aggregate numbers and aggregate numbers from previous years are misleading.
It is an essential factor, unless you make the (implausible) assumption that we have essentially eliminated all other respiratory viruses except for SARS-CoV2.
You can divide the number by any factor you want, but there are still ~6x the number of viruses out there causing colds. Even now.