The regular flu is also an exponential in is early stages. This is pure fear of the unknown. On the badly quarantined Diamond Princess where both crew members (while serving food) and Japanese quarantine health staff working on ship were infected, only 10% of the 400 Americans got infected. And all of those 40 infected recovered, only one required critical care if recollection serves. So 1 out of 400 exposed required critical care. Of the 3711 passengers plus crew, 7 died. 1% of infected and 0.2% of those exposed. The vast majority of the passengers were seniors.