COVID-19 day 153: 📈 2,280,912 cases; 119,975 deaths : 21 June 2020
Ten consecutive days of record-high hospitalizations in Texas; with 183,020 new cases, WHO sets a record; outbreak at Tyson Foods in Arkansas may lead to Chinese ban; 40 news MLB cases
It’s day 153 since the first case of coronavirus disease was announced in the United States. It’s the summer solstice, and it’s also five months since the first case was announced (21 January 2020) in the greater Seattle area.
We will have 9 million global cases on Monday.
📆This past week…
Last week's COVID-19 global news:
China is operating quickly to track last week’s outbreak (Monday)
Chinese study suggests antibody levels drop quickly (Friday)
Masks are now required in three of India’s largest cities (Saturday)
Last week's COVID-19 news in the US:
Eight states report more than 1,000 new cases (Friday)
FDA withdraws authorization for hydroxychloroquine (Monday)
Florida and South Carolina set new records, three successive days (Saturday)
Number of US reported cases up 17% in one week (Saturday)
Oklahoma sets record four of the past six days (Wednesday)
The CDC is actively rejecting media requests from Voice of America, another federal agency that is funded by Congress. (Monday)
US reported 27,762 new cases, the largest number in a month (Thursday)
🦠 Sunday, Johns Hopkins reported 2,280,912 (2,255,119) cases and 119,975 (119,719) deaths, an increase of 1.14% (1.54%) and 0.21% (0.51%), respectively, since Saturday (Friday). A week ago, the daily numbers increased by 0.94% and 0.26%, respectively.
The seven-day average: 25,793 (25,767) cases and 567 (631) deaths
Percent of cases leading to death: 5.26% (5.31%).
Today’s case rate is 688.78 per 100,000; the death rate, 36.24 per 100,000.
One week ago, the case rate was 632.64 per 100,000; the death rate, 34.96 per 100,000.
Note: numbers in (.) are from the prior day and are provided for context. I include the seven-day average because dailies vary so much in the course of a week, particularly over a weekend.
🤓 Recommended reading
Her baby was coming, and her complications were growing more dangerous. But nowhere would take her — an increasingly common story as India’s health care system buckles under pressure [trigger warning].
8 Hospitals in 15 Hours: A Pregnant Woman’s Crisis in the Pandemic. NY Times, 21 June 2020.
This is important; please contact me for a PDF if you do not have access to the NYT.
🎦 Recommended viewing
As COVID-19 spread from Asia to the Middle East to Europe, why was the U.S. caught so unprepared? Despite repeated warnings of a potent contagion headed our way, America’s leaders failed to prepare and protect us. Why and who is accountable?
The Virus: What Went Wrong? PBS Dateline, 16 June 2020.
Sections (no jump links, sorry!)
1, Around the country; 2, Around the world; 3, Politics, economics and COVID-19; 4, Case count; 5, What you can do and resources
⓵ Around the country in charts
This is a Sunday feature; see large versions of the charts on WiredPen.
As you can see from the following charts, very few states display a steadily downward trend in daily per capita case numbers (logarithmic).
The federal recommendation for reopening is that states have 14 days of steadily downward trending case numbers (in absolute numbers) before allowing more freedom for people to gather. This recommendation has been ignored.
The US west and south regions (as defined by the US Census Bureau) are showing an upward trend. The most definitive downward trend is the northwest, which is driven by the March outbreak in New York and New Jersey that has come under control.
Also, see the animated chart, daily COVID-19 deaths compared with average daily deaths by cause.
⓶ Around the world
The European Region accounts for less than a third (29%) of COVID-19 cases (2,527,618) and 42% of COVID-19 deaths (193,086).
The global outbreak is centered in our hemisphere, the Americas, which accounts for about half of global cases (49%, 4,279,854) and deaths (47%, 219,144). WHO data.
⓷ Politics, economics and COVID-19
Tyson Foods is looking into reports that China’s customs agency has suspended poultry imports from a Tyson facility in the United States after coronavirus cases were confirmed among its employees.
Tyson Foods has had yet another outbreak at its poultry plants, this time in Benton and Washington Counties, Arkansas. It is not surprising that China is curtailing raw food imports given that they are still trying to track the source of their current spike.
⚾️Major League Baseball had more than three dozen players and staff test positive this week, further delaying negotiations on a 2020 baseball season.
⓸ Case count
There is a lag between being contagious and showing symptoms, between having a test and getting its results. There is also a lag in reports of cases and deaths making their way into daily results; this lag is visible in predictable declines for both reports containing weekend data.
🌎 21 June
Globally: 8 708 008 cases (183 020 new) with 461 715 deaths (4 743 new)
The Americas: 4 279 854 cases (116 041 new) with 219 144 deaths (3 241 new)
US: 2 208 829 cases (36 617 new) with 118 895 deaths (690 new)
Johns Hopkins interactive dashboard (11.00 pm Pacific)
Global confirmed: 8,953,598 (8,791,794)
Total deaths: 468,346 (464,465)
Recovered: 4,434,641 (4,365,932)
🇺🇸 21 June
CDC: 2,248,029 (32,411) cases and 119,615 (560) deaths
Johns Hopkins*: 2,280,912 (2,255,119) cases and 119,975 (119,719) deaths
State data*: 2,270,766 (2,241,990) identified cases and 113,751 (113,452) deaths
No data from KS (M-W-F), MS (since 17 June), RI (M-F)Total tests (US, Johns Hopkins): 27,084,900 (26,566,553)
Take with a grain of salt. Tests not necessarily people. The CDC and at least 11 other states have combined the data for active infections with data for antibodies, boosting total number of tests which can drop the percentage who test positive.
📣 View weekly state infographics
* Johns Hopkins data, ~11.00 pm Pacific.
State data include DC, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands
The virus was not created in a lab and the weight of evidence is it was not released intentionally. Although early reports tied the outbreak to a market in Wuhan, China, analyses of genomic data in January suggested that the virus might have developed elsewhere.
⓹ What you can do
Stay home as much as possible, period.
Wear a mask when near non-family members.
Digestive problems may be a symptom.
Resources
👓 See COVID-19 resource collection at WiredPen.
📝 Subscribe to Kathy’s COVID-19 Memo :: COVID-19 Memo archives
🦠 COVID-19 @ WiredPen.com
📊 Visualizations: US, World
🌐 Global news (at WiredPen)