– “the infection fatality rate, the proportion of people that get infected who go on to die, is on average less than 1%, multiply that up, you get 3½ million infected with the virus but it could be much higher than that…The infection fatality rate could be half that…”
No. IFR studies internationally are converging on between 1% and 1.5%. It could go higher if covid-19 is allowed to run riot, which causes initial high viral load on each infectee, and hospital overload, but there are no good indications of it being lower.
Regarding comparisons of fatalities between countries, by far the most important consideration is how soon lockdown was imposed; see the chart I compiled here. Early lockdown means less deaths. Comparisons of demographics pale into insignificance by comparison.
– “we’ve passed the peak”
This is such a stupid, misleading phrase that has become popular recently. No. We avoided the peak with the lockdown, and if the restrictions are loosened we’ll just start ascending towards the peak again. Best estimate for numbers infected to date is still the ICL model, which is still under 6%. If we need 60% to have been infected to achieve herd immunity (which is very optimistic, and if that’s even how covid-19 works, it hasn’t existed long enough to find out) then there’s still the potential for this to get 60/6 = ten times worse.
I really don’t know which is worse, government policy or corporate media coverage. Both are entirely unfit for purpose. And remember that the politicians themselves gain many of their impressions from the corporate media. The best thing I have found to do with it is simply avoid it.
Regarding the lack of independence of SAGE: