疫情

indy

COVID 19 UPDATE
April 18th, 2020

Hope everyone is doing well. Best to you and your families. Stay Safe and Stay Strong. We are all in this together.

NUMBER OF CASES:
Since I last posted seven days ago,  there have been almost 180,000 new cases. We now have a total of 734,969 cases. Luckily the curves are flattening in some part of the country. However, in some states the numbers are beginning to rise. NJ, MA, TX, WA, CA are sloping upward. The next few weeks are highly crucial as the federal and local agencies discuss relaxing stay at home and social distancing rules. Unless we have a reliable way of testing and tracking in large numbers, it will be very difficult to "get back to normal"

20% of US COVID 19 infections are among the healthcare professionals. This is just not acceptable.

https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/wr/pdfs/mm6915e6-H.pdf

TESTING:

Testing has been ramped up for the past month. Please note that all states are not reporting all the tests performed. So the data could be underreported. So far 3.7 million tests have been performed. The positivity rate is 19.6%.

So, what does that 19.6% mean? For example. S. Korea's overall positive rate was 3% and at the peak of their curve, it was 6%. That's the advantage of early testing in large numbers. During the first 50 days after detecting case #1, S.Korea tested 75,000 people. The US tested 253 people. We are now playing for it. Too late.

TESTING DELAYS AND THE CDC:

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/18/us/coronavirus-live-news.html

MORTALITY:
Since I last posted 7 days ago, there have been 16,000 additional COVID related deaths in the US.  While the total number of cases are flattening, there appears to be no flattening in sight for the mortality curve. The institute of health recently lowered the number of deaths to 60,000 by August. The actual numbers speak otherwise. We already have almost 40,000 deaths. We need to see much more flattening of the mortality curve. Sadly, it is still on an upslope!!

ARE WE COUNTING RIGHT?

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/17/us/coronavirus-death-rate.html

https://www.theatlantic.com/tech ... tivity-rate/610132/

HOW DOES CORONAVIRUS KILL?

This is a very well written article. A must read.

https://www.sciencemag.org/news/ ... gh-body-brain-toes#

A SIX FOLD INCREASE IN MORTALITY IN AFRICAN AMERICANS:

"A 6-fold increase in the rate of death for African Americans due to a now ubiquitous virus should be deemed unconscionable. This is a moment of ethical reckoning."

https://jamanetwork.com/journals ... amp;linkId=86621084

SECOND WAVE:

As we are eager and anxious to get back our normal way of living, it is important to note that some cities in the US had major second wave rebounds during the 1918 flu pandemic.

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/208354

FOR NOW............

#STAYATHOME
#PHYSICALDISTANCING
#MASKS
#HANDWASHING
#STAYSTRONG

THANK YOU:
My heart goes out to all the healthcare professionals and the first responders, who are literally in the line of fire, armed with tank tops and flip flops! You are the true heroes!
A special word of appreciation and respect for the scientific community for tirelessly working towards a treatment plan and a potential vaccine. As they have done with Smallpox, Polio, and recently with Ebola, it will be the men and women of the scientific community who will be our saviors

Thanks to Financial Times for removing the paywall and making this website accessible for free.
https://www.ft.com/coronavirus-latest
Stay Safe and Stay Strong! This illness has the potential to test our individual and collective resolve in ways we cannot imagine.

indy

indy