Coronavirus in the United States - news and thoughts

Again....NC's death rate was skewed last week by weird holiday reporting.
Look before and after. The number has settled right back down. Our governor, a Democrat who has reacted strongly, has felt we are doing well enough, he had very strict criteria to reach phase two. The state met that criteria. Testing in NC is easy. I believe @citygator talked about it earlier. I have staff members who got tested basically on demand.
Our drive through testing site downtown is open and it takes 5 minutes.

Testing is pretty randomized in my city.

But the past 2 days our death total is 9 and 12...then 13 today...right back where it was prior to the quirky holiday spike.

Also needs to be mentioned that 60%-70% happened in nursing homes in this state.

 

Here's an update. The following data are 3-day interval increases. After substantial increases in the May 30 interval, the numbers have come back down. This is the lowest U.S. fatality total for the data pool, going back to May 3. On the other hand, it's the second highest world case total for a three day period. Increased testing likely results in higher case counts, but no matter how you assuage that - increased cases may lead to increased fatalities. We may be heading in the right direction, but we're far from out of the weeds on this pandemic.

Let's hope that the nationwide protests in major metros does not have a negative impact on the U.S. numbers. That would not likely be evident for another 3-4 weeks and occur in consequence with the steady decrease. Will be interesting to observe those potential effects. I'm all for reductions and low numbers. Let's get rid of this damn thing.

Increases
Date.......world cases.....world deaths.....U.S. cases.....U.S. deaths
May3........255,940............14,061...............93,006...........4,731
May6........258,072............16,907...............75,063...........6,212
May9........278,941............15,389...............84,217...........5,238
May12......239,189............12,376...............61,327...........3,388
May15......284,608............15,658...............75,649...........5,082
May18......266,271............11,660...............66,009...........3,474
May21…....303,083…….....…14,472………........70,608…….......4,373
May24…....303,683…….....…12,072………........65,534…….......2,946
May27…....291,339……….....10,756………........59,367…….......2,807
May30…....364,906…….....…13,454………........71,017…….......3,450
June2……..324,528………......11,316………........64,385…….......2,502

 

No testing is not pretty randomized in your city. It's not pretty randomized anywhere. And new cases are on a steady rise in NC and that is not entirely caused by more testing.

As for the 60-70% of deaths happening in nursing homes, we see that a lot from your side -- discounting nursing home deaths. That's not much comfort for those of us with parents in nursing homes.

 

are you ever positive about anything?

 

Yes.

 

There is weekly variance. Yes, there was lower before and after due to the weekends before and after. But it can't purely be explained by the holiday weekend, as that would explain May 27, the highest reading for North Carolina of the entire pandemic, but not May 28 (2nd highest), or May 29 (5th highest). Then, it went back into the weekend.

 

I am not discounting anyone. But nursing homes are unique in that my goind to work has little impact on them.
That's a pretty cheap shot though.

And I can go get a test tomorrow with barely a sniffle and know many who have. It's pretty randomized here.

And what exactly is"my side"?
If you mean outspoken praise for my liberal governor and full support of the shutdown that he imposed then you might be right. That has been my position all along. Are you suggesting that my support for his handling is somehow a right wing position? Cons hate Roy Cooper. I have praised him for Hurricane Florence and Covid-19.

If you disagree with my perspective of this state, then you disagree with YOUR side, because that is the side I have been on in almost every part of this.

 

Dude, leave him alone. He unlocked my secret hatred for people in nursing homes. Especially when my Grandmother lived in one at the end of her life. I fooled everyone by going to visit her and stuff. My wife used to take our kids into other rooms just to brighten the days of elderly strangers so they wouldn't catch on to our hatred of them. Dangole done figured it out.

 

just a little sarcasm?

 

I don't think you understand what 'randomized' means. It doesn't mean readily available. In fact you being able to voluntarily go get a test is the opposite of randomized. That is you self-selecting yourself.

And your side is the side that somehow thinks people coming into physical contact more somehow won't lead to an increase in cases. That is just ignorance.

As for what you think is a 'cheap shot', nursing homes are very much affected by an increase in cases outside of them. The one my mother stays at just announced 12 employees have tested positive. Yet no residents have tested positive (yet, it's just a matter of time now). Those employees don't live at the home. They go out and about and catch the virus on the outside and bring it to the inside.

 

When I say "randomized" I mean we have moved past having to have multiple symptoms to get a test. Perhaps broad sample is a better term.

And of course I u understand people work in nursing homes. What is your suggestion? Those folks need groceries etc.

The cheap shot is insinuating I don't care because I cited a relevant stat.

As for sides, I have been much more in li e with the left for most of this journey.

I certainly pray that your mom's home will dodge the bullet. I know that is concerning to everyone involved.

 

Well, that didn’t go as planned.

Man Behind Sweden’s Controversial Virus Strategy Admits Mistakes

 

And their economy is tanking..

"What’s more, there’s so far limited evidence that Sweden’s decision to leave much of its society open will support the economy. Finance Minister Magdalena Andersson recently warned that Sweden is facing its worst economic crisis since World War II, with GDP set to slump 7% in 2020, roughly as much as the rest of the EU"

 

10 times the deaths as their neighbors, and their economy still tanked? That doesn't sound like a good deal.

 

The whole point was to try to prevent the economy from tanking. So yeah, not a good deal at all.

Others might follow this closely, but is there any major country that continues to fare well economically?

 

There were studies that showed cities that took mitigation actions during the 1918 Spanish Flu bounced back stronger than those that simply tried to “power through” the deaths without any mitigations. People ignore such historical lessons at their own peril.

Those that believed there was an option without economic disruption were either intentionally spreading misinformation, or just lack a basic degree of intelligence. I don’t think it’s coincidence there is an obviously observable correlation between these types, and Trump worshipers.

 

Where I am there was a spike happening the same week we were “opening up”, including an outbreak among hospital staff. Which made it seem ludicrous the hospital was opening back up for elective procedures right at that exact time.

However, the numbers have actually gone down despite that horrible timing. A few people are still dying that have been long term ICU, but the new cases have slowed to a trickle. So I think clearly the high heat and humidity is helping to slow the spread - either that or it has mutated to be less deadly (which is what some Italians have suggested).

This is good news for the summer, but obviously they need to be monitoring once next years flu season starts to watch for that second wave.