Coronavirus Thread

[Techster]

...and in GA:

https://www.ajc.com/news/coronavirus-georgia-covid-dashboard/jvoLBozRtBSVSNQDDAuZxH/

Numbers are starting to tick up across the board. Infections, hospitalizations, and deaths all starting to trend up. Not by an alarming amount, but up nonetheless. Hopefully the trend line can find its way down...but given GA is pretty much 100% open, social distancing is pretty much a joke, and people are relaxed about wearing face mask...well, I don't see that trend line going down for a while.

 

[RonJohn]

Nursing home deaths top 50,000.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/corona...g-term-care-facilities-top-50-000-11592306919

Dr. Fauci admits he’s a liar (seriously):
https://thehill.com/changing-americ...fauci-why-the-public-wasnt-told-to-wear-masks

Who of us walks around with N95 masks? NOBODY. The fact he told us all we didn’t need to wear masks because he was scared we’d deplete medical grade masks is insane. That’s not an excuse to lie. What else was he lying about?

Where in that article does it say he lied? The Surgeon General did post a tweet that said masks are NOT effective at controlling COVID-19 in the general public, but I haven't seen similar statements from Fauci. There is a large difference between not recommending masks for the general public while the general public was being requested to basically isolate and lying.

Actually the CDC didn't recommend masks either until there was evidence of more spread from asymptomatic people than previously thought. (An announcement which Kemp was ridiculed for repeating.)

 

[MWBATL]

My parents' lives are priceless. There's no dollar value you can assign to their lives that would justify not doing what we did when we did it. Knowing what we know now, maybe that decision is different, but Monday-morning QB's always rated high. It was the correct decision regardless of the economic discrepancies.

No doubt. And no argument.

But in the immortal words of Stalin, "one death is a tragedy, but a million are merely a statistic."

it is brutal, but when you must make decisions for an entire society, you must think about the overall health and survival of the society.

 

[MWBATL]

...and in GA:

https://www.ajc.com/news/coronavirus-georgia-covid-dashboard/jvoLBozRtBSVSNQDDAuZxH/

Numbers are starting to tick up across the board. Infections, hospitalizations, and deaths all starting to trend up. Not by an alarming amount, but up nonetheless. Hopefully the trend line can find its way down...but given GA is pretty much 100% open, social distancing is pretty much a joke, and people are relaxed about wearing face mask...well, I don't see that trend line going down for a while.

As long as we don't overwhelm our medical system (hospital beds, primarily), we must learn to live with this virus.....and we remain well below that threshold.

 

[WreckinGT]

...and in GA:

https://www.ajc.com/news/coronavirus-georgia-covid-dashboard/jvoLBozRtBSVSNQDDAuZxH/

Numbers are starting to tick up across the board. Infections, hospitalizations, and deaths all starting to trend up. Not by an alarming amount, but up nonetheless. Hopefully the trend line can find its way down...but given GA is pretty much 100% open, social distancing is pretty much a joke, and people are relaxed about wearing face mask...well, I don't see that trend line going down for a while.

Numbers are probably going to go up here or at least stay somewhat level for a while. It sucks that we can’t improve the situation like most developed countries are but at least (so far) we are avoiding the massive spikes that Florida, Texas, Arizona, and some others are seeing.

 

[Deleted member 2897]

Where in that article does it say he lied? The Surgeon General did post a tweet that said masks are NOT effective at controlling COVID-19 in the general public, but I haven't seen similar statements from Fauci. There is a large difference between not recommending masks for the general public while the general public was being requested to basically isolate and lying.

Actually the CDC didn't recommend masks either until there was evidence of more spread from asymptomatic people than previously thought. (An announcement which Kemp was ridiculed for repeating.)

He admits he told people not to wear masks because he was worried about the PPE shortage. Given that none of the masks people wear in public are hospital grade PPE, this of course was a silly excuse to ignore science. But yes, he gave official healthcare guidance which he knows is the opposite of what we should have been told. Whether someone agrees with the reason he lied doesn’t change the fact he lied.

Imagine if he would have advocated for young people to go out in public 2 months ago, saying younger people couldn’t get sick. Then 2 months later he admits he knew they could get sick, but wanted to try and get closer to herd immunity and young people are less likely to die.

 

[Deleted member 2897]

Numbers are probably going to go up here or at least stay somewhat level for a while. It sucks that we can’t improve the situation like most developed countries are but at least (so far) we are avoiding the massive spikes that Florida, Texas, Arizona, and some others are seeing.

Our country is a group of states, so we shut down so early in some states that we never even remotely saw the New York spike that Spain, Italy, the UK, and others saw. For example, my states total cases (SC) are still lower than all those countries on a population adjusted basis. So yes we haven’t seen the decreasing trend right now in S.C. that they are, but it’s because we were much more successful here in never allowing the peak to ravage us like they all did. If I look at our per capita numbers but ignore the spike part - just look at the total area under the curves for cases and deaths, and we are approximately in line with pretty much everyone else.

 

[Techster]

Numbers are probably going to go up here or at least stay somewhat level for a while. It sucks that we can’t improve the situation like most developed countries are but at least (so far) we are avoiding the massive spikes that Florida, Texas, Arizona, and some others are seeing.

Trend line for hospitalizations usually falls in line with the trend line for infections. Unfortunately, in the states you mentioned, hospitalizations from Covid are beginning to soar now.

I don't have too much hope for GA given what I've witnessed in the past month. I'll cross my fingers, but hope and reality are usually not related.

 

[WreckinGT]

Our country is a group of states, so we shut down so early in some states that we never even remotely saw the New York spike that Spain, Italy, the UK, and others saw. For example, my states total cases (SC) are still lower than all those countries on a population adjusted basis. So yes we haven’t seen the decreasing trend right now in S.C. that they are, but it’s because we were much more successful here in never allowing the peak to ravage us like they all did. If I look at our per capita numbers but ignore the spike part - just look at the total area under the curves for cases and deaths, and we are approximately in line with pretty much everyone else.

Yes, the cases per capita in South Carolina are pretty similar to Italy but SC's cases are currently spiking while Italy's are mostly under control. With the current trends, it won't be long until SC's numbers are a good bit worse than Italy's unless you are expecting a swift end to the current surge or a resurgence in Italy's numbers. Italy has over 10x as many people as SC but now have far fewer cases than SC on a daily basis. Would you rather be Italy going forward or SC?

 

[Deleted member 2897]

Yes, the cases per capita in South Carolina are pretty similar to Italy but SC's cases are currently spiking while Italy's are mostly under control. With the current trends, it won't be long until SC's numbers are a good bit worse than Italy's unless you are expecting a swift end to the current surge or a resurgence in Italy's numbers. Italy has over 10x as many people as SC but now have far fewer cases than SC on a daily basis. Would you rather be Italy going forward or SC?

I am happy to always be South Carolina, both past, current, and where we’re headed. Hospitalizations here haven’t budged the entire time. A significantly large percentage of our new cases are young people, So while I wish they would do a better job of social distancing and wearing masks, there is zero evidence we are doing anything similar to Italy. We’ve had 7 total deaths the last 3 days (for example), all elderly, whereas Italy was seeing 1000 deaths a day. We have 1/10th their population but 1/60th their deaths.

 

[WreckinGT]

I am happy to always be South Carolina, both past, current, and where we’re headed. Hospitalizations here haven’t budged the entire time. A significantly large percentage of our new cases are young people, So while I wish they would do a better job of social distancing and wearing masks, there is zero evidence we are doing anything similar to Italy. We’ve had 7 total deaths the last 3 days (for example), all elderly, whereas Italy was seeing 1000 deaths a day. We have 1/10th their population but 1/60th their deaths.

So you aren't concerned at all that the recent rise in numbers of cases in SC is going to lead to more hospitalizations and eventually deaths?

 

[jacketup]

According to the CDC through June 10, there have been almost twice as many pneumonia deaths this year in the 15-24 age group as from COVID-19. There have been almost half as many flu deaths in that age group as compared COVID-19. And the numbers are relatively small for all 3 diseases.

So by many people's logic, as long as we have any deaths from any contagious disease, we should not have in person contact on campuses or elsewhere. Is illogical panic the new normal? What is driving it--that's what I want to know.

 

[Deleted member 2897]

So you aren't concerned at all that the recent rise in numbers of cases in SC is going to lead to more hospitalizations and eventually deaths?

We've been re-opened for over a month now. Our highest daily positive case record was re-set to a new high on May 15th. A month ago. It has then been almost continuously reset week after week over the last month. Our hospitalization rate hasn't changed but a couple percent (statewide its increased by ~3% over the last month). Typically, you're not going to see a wave of increasing deaths if you're not seeing a wave of hospitalizations first. There are lags between cases and hospitalizations and hospitalizations and deaths. We're 2 weeks into when hospitalizations should have increased, but they haven't. Maybe its because so many of the new cases are younger people.

Some people have said our cases are increasing because we recently started testing twice as many people. I think that's false, because the percentage of tests that come back positive has increased from 3%-5% to 13%-15%. That tells me its more of an outbreak than more testing. But its likely that's the other side of this - that maybe our actual cases in the wild hasn't increased nearly as much as you would think, and that most of those are younger people too. And that's why hospitalizations haven't changed much. I guess we will see.

 

[Techster]

 

[MWBATL]

Unfortunately, in the states you mentioned, hospitalizations from Covid are beginning to soar now.

Curious to see that data. I had just posted a chart which showed hospitalizations (in aggregate across the entire country) were continuing on a nice downward trend.

 

[Deleted member 2897]

Curious to see that data. I had just posted a chart which showed hospitalizations (in aggregate across the entire country) were continuing on a nice downward trend.

I posted ours in SC - as best I can tell they are up maybe 3% over the last month. Here is Florida's, which to me appears to be decreasing.

 

[MountainBuzzMan]

The largest new cases are in California, Texas and Florida. They accounted for about 10,000 of our 23K new cases yesterday in the US.

 

[Techster]

Curious to see that data. I had just posted a chart which showed hospitalizations (in aggregate across the entire country) were continuing on a nice downward trend.

Texas (holy sh!t):
https://www.tmc.edu/coronavirus-updates/tmc-daily-new-covid-19-hospitalizations/

North Carolina:
https://covid19.ncdhhs.gov/dashboard

Arizona:
https://publichealth.arizona.edu/news/2020/covid-19-forecast-model

Florida (Florida has been on a consistent line of inept governance):
https://tallahasseereports.com/2020...ive-trends-for-florida-in-coronavirus-battle/

**Something to also keep in mind with this data (and all data) is not all states were released from shelter in place and shutdowns at one time. Data and infections are still trailing. The states that let out early (GA, TX) are just starting to see the uptick on their data.

 

[RamblinRed]

According to the CDC through June 10, there have been almost twice as many pneumonia deaths this year in the 15-24 age group as from COVID-19. There have been almost half as many flu deaths in that age group as compared COVID-19. And the numbers are relatively small for all 3 diseases.

So by many people's logic, as long as we have any deaths from any contagious disease, we should not have in person contact on campuses or elsewhere. Is illogical panic the new normal? What is driving it--that's what I want to know.

That is not what is being said at all.
There will be kids on campus in the fall ,at least through Thanksgiving. Not everyone on campus is 18-24 and it isn't just about deaths. it's about how many people get sick.
According to the CDC the incidence rate is higher among 40-50 yr olds than 60-79 yr olds. There are alot of 40-59 yr olds on a college campus.

It's really pretty simple. Wear a mask, wash your hands, keep distance when you can.
There are a couple of studies now that suggest if at least 80% of people wear masks then the transmission rate drops by up to 99%. But you have to hit 80%+

It is still primarily about not overloading the health care system, on a national level that is not a current issue, there are some local places - like Montgomery, that are running at close to 100% utilization. But there is enough of it in the environment that if we don't do simple things there is a potential for health systems in some areas to get overwhelmed quickly if they have spikes.

 

[MWBATL]

Texas (holy sh!t):
https://www.tmc.edu/coronavirus-updates/tmc-daily-new-covid-19-hospitalizations/

North Carolina:
https://covid19.ncdhhs.gov/dashboard

Arizona:
https://publichealth.arizona.edu/news/2020/covid-19-forecast-model

Florida (Florida has been on a consistent line of inept governance):
https://tallahasseereports.com/2020...ive-trends-for-florida-in-coronavirus-battle/

**Something to also keep in mind with this data (and all data) is not all states were released from shelter in place and shutdowns at one time. Data and infections are still trailing. The states that let out early (GA, TX) are just starting to see the uptick on their data.

It will be interesting to watch, but I have heard chatter that the southwestern states (CA, AZ, TX) are all likely being affected by people fleeing Mexico, as I hear things are bad south of the border. Not sure that is something that the data can account for easily. Cases figures to me continue to be a red herring, as testing grows and more asymptotic cases are discovered it really is not a threat to our society if that is all we are seeing. It is why (to me) hospitalizations matter, not cases.

Also not sure that surges worry me much when the baseline is so low to begin with. The mortality data on states like GA (24 deaths per 100,000), FL (14 deaths per 100,000), and TX (7 deaths per 100,000) are so much lower than the New England states, all of whom are now well over 100 deaths per 100,000. Part of all of this is learning how to live with covid....and what makes sense and what doesn't. Wearing masks is still good idea for going anywhere indoors, and sanitary practices as well.

Overall data for the country continues on its steady downward path, as I posted yesterday.

It has been hard to predict how all this would go, but the panic about new waves seems premature to me. Your criticism of the leadership in certain states also seems unsupported by the data.

https://gis.cdc.gov/grasp/COVIDNet/COVID19_5.html

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1109011/coronavirus-covid19-death-rates-us-by-state/