You still have to compare that to the baseline of the demographic. I.e. once you’re over eighty, you have almost a 1% probability to die within the next month.
True absolutely, but not true if you condition on me being fit enough for a cruise today.
Yes, and COVID-19 would be a lot less bad if we had a broadly effective (even if as imperfect as the season at flu vaccine tends to be) generally available vaccine that would naturally be more likely to be taken by the most vulnerable, but alas we don't, which reinforces the point that COVID-19 is, in the real world, significantly worse than the flu, even if you could construct a counterfactual scenario where that would be less true despite the diseases each retaining their intrinsic traits.
What would change though if that were true is that the calculus could shift away from locking down (SIP) to limited social distancing measures (to reduce r0) and a complete isolation of your most vulnerable populations. Basically, go for some sort of herd immunity if you can keep the herd's IIR below 0.01% or so.
The only data broad enough to predict true cases is Diamond Princess or perhaps Iceland where you've had enormous testing. Even on Diamond Princess, you have 10/712 infections resulting in death which is worse than flu (for this population), but not 10x as bad. Iceland has 2 deaths and 25 hospitalized against 500+ cases 1.5w ago, suggestive of a sub 1% CFR.
Additionally, flu CFR is reduced by targetted vaccination of the most vulnerable people (demographics of who get infected are more likely to survive than general population).