COVID-19 day 158: 📈 2,467,554 cases; 125,039 deaths : 26 June 2020
Florida reports 8,942 cases; FL, GA, ID, SC, TN and UT set new daily records; US sets new daily record, 45K+; 3-in-4 Americans worry about getting infected; EU may ban visitors from US and Brazil
It’s day 158 since the first case of coronavirus disease was announced in the United States. This chart shows the difference in how leadership in the United States and the European Union have approached the pandemic. But why do editorials and analyses focus on Europe when Asia has been even more successful at containment?
When Beijing experienced a (small) spike earlier this month, Chinese leaders tested 2.4 million people, more than 10% of the city’s population, in 10 days. Florida, with about the same population as Beijing, has tested 1.8 million since it started testing. It had almost 9,000 new cases on Friday. Beijing had SEVEN cases on Wednesday.
In Maryland, a man who challenged Gov. Larry Hogan’s shut-down orders by holding rallies around the state announced that he is infected. The 53-year-old Navy veteran is refusing to cooperate with the state or county contact-trace programs.
THIS is why we’ll be the last nation on the planet to get COVID-19 under control.
The numbers are becoming numbing again. On Friday, six states set new records for daily COVID-19 case reports: Florida (8,942), Georgia (1,900), Idaho (283), South Carolina (1313), Tennessee (1,410) and Utah (676).
Half of all reported cases are from four states: Arizona, California, Florida and Texas.
Globally, we will pass 10 million cases and 500,000 deaths this weekend.
🦠 Friday, Johns Hopkins reported 2,467,554 (2,422,310) cases and 125,039 (124,410 ) deaths, an increase of 1.87% (1.72%) and 0.51% (1.99%), respectively, since Thursday (Wednesday). A week ago, the daily numbers increased by 1.37% and 0.57%, respectively.
The seven-day average: 34,563 (32,378) cases and 826 (837) deaths
Percent of cases leading to death: 5.10% (5.14%).
Today’s case rate is 737.1 per 100,000; the death rate, 37.56 per 100,000.
One week ago, the case rate was 670.98 per 100,000; the death rate, 35.99 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 and viewing
News roundup: Trump Administration Asks Supreme Court To Overturn Health Law In Midst Of Escalating Pandemic. KHN, 26 June 2020.
This is hard to watch but you should.
If you’re “of a certain age,” you may have heard of ACE (angiotensin converting enzyme) inhibitors, medicines that relax blood vessels to help lower blood pressure.
The virus that causes COVID-19, SARS-CoV-2, enters our body’s cells through ACE2 (angiotensin-converting enzyme 2) receptors, which are proteins on the surface of some cell types. For example, they line the insides of blood vessels in the kidneys, the gastrointestinal tract and even the testes. On average, about 40% of kidney tubule cells have ACE2 receptors. Cells in the GI tract are among “the strongest expressors of ACE2 receptors,” according to scientist Venky Soundararajan.
It’s not just the lungs: The Covid-19 virus attacks like no other ‘respiratory’ infection. STAT News, 26 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
Governors are closing bars and putting “re-opening” on pause in California, Florida and Texas.
Public health authorities have identified bars as the locus of outbreaks in Louisiana, Florida, Wyoming and Idaho. Last weekend, the Texas alcohol licensing board suspended the liquor licenses of 17 bars after undercover agents observed crowds flouting emergency rules that required patrons to keep a safe distance from one another and limit tavern occupancy.
Most of us think we the country is relaxing physical distancing too fast (“opening up the economy”) and 3-in-4 are worried about getting infected, reversing a two-month decline. With good reason:
⓶ Around the world
The European Union is preparing to reopen its borders to travelers but visitors from Brazil, Russia and the United States look to be excluded.
The differences between the United States and the European Union include proactive leadership and an appreciation for science.
⓷ Politics, economics and COVID-19
“If we don’t extinguish the outbreak, sooner or later, even [states] that are doing well are going to be vulnerable to the spread.” Dr. Anthony S. Fauci
Despite the lack of evidence for the claim, Vice President Pence presented successive days with record COVID-19 numbers as a victory for testing.
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.
🌎 26 June
Globally: 9 473 214 cases (177 012 new) with 484 249 deaths (5 116 new)
The Americas: 4 709 927 cases (105 793 new) with 233 628 deaths (3 463 new)
US: 2 367 064 cases (37 601 new) with 121 645 deaths (690 new)
Johns Hopkins interactive dashboard (11.00 pm Pacific)
Global confirmed: 9,801,958 (9,609,829)
Total deaths: 494,181 (489,318)
Recovered: 4,945,557 (4,838,921)
🇺🇸 26 June
For the second night in a row, data compilations have been off.
The COVID Tracking Project data for Wisconsin do not match the state website: the state (and Bing tracker) shows 26,747 total cases versus 29,668 from CTP. There was a similar discrepancy Thursday.
Thursday night, Johns Hopkins did not publish a “daily” report on GitHub; they normally publish one between 8 and 10 pm Pacific. I pulled data from the dashboard, like I did in March and April. Tonight the report is on schedule but the data are significantly less than that from CTP (and Bing tracker). So again, pulled from the dashboard.
▪️▪️▪️
CDC: 2,414,870 (40,588) cases and 124,325 (2,516*) deaths
* from NJ adjustment earlier in the weekJohns Hopkins*: 2,467,554 (2,422,310) cases and 125,039 (124,410 ) deaths
State data*: 2,453,607 (2,411,400) identified cases and 118,663 (118,036) deaths
KS reports only M-W-FTotal tests (US, Johns Hopkins): 29,810,767 (29,207,820)
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)