[mbrubeck]

The South China Morning Post (Hong Kong's newspaper of record) reports that China excluded 43,000 confirmed-but-asymptomatic cases from its official statistics, and kept the true number classified:

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/3076323/thir...

This would mean that the true number of confirmed cases in China is more than 50% higher than the official number.

[blackrock]

Well, if your statement is correct, then this actually lowers their death rate, the CFR (Case Fatality Ratio).

They reported 81,285 cases. So, 81,285 + 43,000 = 124,285 cases.

And 3287 deaths. So, that’s a 2.64% death rate.

At these numbers, and with the virus now worldwide, I think China’s numbers are now irrelevant. It’s better to begin focusing our energies on mitigation and containment.

[yread]

Estimating CFR is difficult, but it's probably still lower than that

https://twitter.com/mlipsitch/status/1243373051351359488

[koheripbal]

Not only that - China has refused to participate in an international WHO serology study to see the % of people with antibodies.

...it's not much of a leap to imagine that the reason is to hide the true number that were infected.