https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/stephaniemlee/coronavirus-cdc-infection-fatality-rate

But five other experts told BuzzFeed News they were perplexed that the CDC’s highest estimated fatality rate is lower than estimates for some of the world’s hardest-hit areas.

In the CDC’s deadliest scenario, the infection fatality rate for the virus is about 0.8%. But in New York City, an estimated 0.86% to 0.93% of all people who got sick died, according to two preliminary analyses of available data, including a recent antibody survey that provided the best estimate yet of the total number of residents who have been infected. Those figures would put the death rate in the city — hit with the most lethal outbreak in the US, with at least 16,600 COVID-19 deaths to date — beyond the CDC’s worst-case scenario.

“Surely the worst-case scenario should at least be New York for the whole country,” said Gideon Meyerowitz-Katz, an epidemiologist at the University of Wollongong in Australia, who has been tracking infection fatality rates in New York City and elsewhere.

And Natalie Dean, a University of Florida biostatistician, said, “The point is that you [should] capture a range of scenarios based on what data we have available right now. With the data we have available right now, we can’t rule out something higher. A worst-case scenario needs to be a real worst-case scenario.”