In most outbreaks, "confirmed" usually means those sick enough to seek medical attention and get a diagnosis. If asymptomatic testing goes up then CFR declines, but then CFR ceases to be a useful metric for comparing and contrasting outbreaks. Arguably it already has diminished utility in this particular outbreak because of inconsistent testing criteria around the world.
I think what most people want to know (and what they believe CFR means) is the percentage of deaths among the infected. But AFAICT this sort of number isn't very common in the literature as ascertaining the total number of infected for most outbreaks[1] is very difficult, and presumably something that can only be deduced post hoc with modeling.
[1] Ebola being one possible exception, given the extremely high lethality and distinctive symptoms.
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019%E2%80%9320_coronavirus_ou...
They know something that you don't. Which is that the test has both a high false negative and a high false positive rate. Which means that its effectiveness as a decision making tool is limited.
That said, the longer you wait to start quarantine, the longer you have to keep quarantine measures in place. But on the flip side, if extreme responses are too good, then you increase the risk that on the next serious threat, people will yawn and fail to comply.
Public health has a wicked problem here. The more effective it is, the less that people feel it is needed.
I think a lot of people would rather just let the virus spread.
It's been really is very easy to see the future up until now. There's 9000 cases in Italy now; by the 16th of March, factoring in the containment measures, they could be 60-80k.
About 10% need intensive care; there's probably 3000 IC beds available now. Very simple.