[forewarning]

Some good observations, but waffles the basic question.

[SauronOfMordor]

The really troubling thing is that we really don't have good numbers yet for how bad this is. We have numbers for people who were sick enough to require medical attention (and if you're on that list, your outlook is serious -- outside of mainland China, the death rate looks to be over 10%, when you discount people who are still sick).

What we don't know is what percentage of people are naturally immune, and what percentage of people will just get minor symptoms and recover without needing medical attention.

Another big issue is the mutation rate. SARS is in the same family as the common cold. The reason you don't get immunity from colds is that you keep getting hit with mutated different variants. It's one thing if SARS can hit you once, and maybe kill you. It's another thing if it can keep coming back every few months, killing more people each time.