COVID-19 day 204: 📈 46,808 new cases, 1,074 new deaths (US): 11 August 2020
Global cases cross 20M; Georgia has the largest seven-day per capita daily cases in the country, Idaho, the largest in the west; why can't we just say no to stadiums of fans and college football?
It’s day 204 since the first case of coronavirus disease was announced in the United States. Global cases have crossed 20 million. The first million took 28 days; the most recent million, five days. The first 10 million took six months; the next 10 million, about six weeks.
Forgive me. I can’t answer the football question, but I will give you some data.
Sections (no jump links, sorry!)
1, One big thing; 2, Key metrics; 3, Recommendations; 4, Politics, economics & COVID;
5, Resources
⓵ One big thing - averages hide outliers (with a dash of college football)
The recent surge in cases has paused. Dailies have leveled off; new cases and new hospitalizations have both stabilized but at much higher levels (50,000 to 60,000 cases per day) than in the spring (20,000 to 30,000 cases per day), according to COVID Tracking Project data. Daily deaths continue to increase in approximately 20 states and territories.
This National Geographic map shows where deaths for the last seven days have increased compared to the prior week.
R1 dipped below 1 with weekend data; will it hold? Unlikely.
Although the southern US has had seven-day per capita daily new cases equivalent to those of the northeast in when the outbreak began, the regional response among political leaders, and thus the citizenry, has not been the same.
These groupings, however, hide the outliers, like many averages.
The western state with the largest per capita seven-day average case numbers is Idaho, with 268 confirmed cases per 1 million population. Even though daily cases are declining, the south carries the brunt of the seven-day average case numbers, with Georgia having the worst seven-day new case average, 332, in the country.
But state data can also hide impacts.
I live in Snohomish County, Washington, just north of King County. In my county, 0.673% of the population has tested positive. In King County, 0.746% of the population has tested positive.
Let’s shift to Georgia, again detail by county: Fulton (Atlanta, 1.962% of the population has tested positive); Dougherty (Albany, where the first outbreak occurred, 3.131%); and Terrell (Dawson, a poorer county west of Dougherty, 3.528%).
This dramatic difference in rates (more than three-fold) is unlikely to be due to the number of tests. The number of tests conducted in Washington is 13% of its population; in Georgia, 18%. (Number of tests is not the same as percent population tested.)
On Tuesday, the Big Ten and Pac-12 each canceled fall sports. These states are not in the top 10 list above.
In a sport so popular that it has created a multibillion-dollar industry with head coaches making as much as $9 million per year, big decisions are still made by university presidents…
The Pac-12 assembled a medical advisory committee in March when the NCAA shut down winter and spring sports. That group has been in near-constant contact, gathering research and hatching plans for how amateur sports could somehow be played during a pandemic…
In the Big Ten, Indiana freshman offensive lineman Brady Feeney went through “14 days of hell,” according to a Facebook post by his mother. Debbie Rucker said her son has experienced heart issues and that no matter how safe a school’s COVID-19 protocols might appear, “you CAN’T PROTECT THEM!!”
Yet the Southeastern Conference thinks college football should move forward as though there were no pandemic. The University of Georgia opening football game is against the University of Arkansas: both states are in the top 10 list of seven-day per capita average new cases. You can’t make this up; it’s crazy.
Aside: that multi-billion industry is the tail wagging the dog. It’s a bubble of money; it’s not funding academics, research and scholarships for main campus.
The “corporate-athletics complex,” as [New York Times reporter Mike McIntire] calls it, corrupts universities, skirts federal tax laws, bullies the IRS, relies heavily on private donors, and sets players up to fail after their sports careers are over by pushing them into academically vapid curriculums.
⓶ Key metrics
🦠 Tuesday, Johns Hopkins reported 5,141,208 (46,808 new🔺) cases and 164,537 (1,074 new🔺) deaths, an increase of 0.92% and 0,66%, respectively, since Monday. A week ago, the daily numbers increased by 1.22% and 0.90%, respectively.
Today
- seven-day average: 53,459 cases🔻 and 1,142 deaths🔺
- 3.20% cases leading to death
- case rate, 155 per 10,000; death rate, 5 per 10,000One week ago
- seven-day average: 60,103 cases🔺 and 1,099 deaths🔺
- 3.29% cases leading to death
- case rate, 1,441 per 10,000; death rate, 47 per 10,000
Note: the seven-day average is important because dailies vary due to factors other than actual case numbers, particularly over a weekend.
🇺🇸 11 August
CDC: 5,064,171 (40,522 new) cases & 162,407 (565 new) deaths
- One week ago: 4,698,818 (49,716 new) cases & 155,204 (733 new) deathsState data*: 5,116,474 (55,594 new🔺) cases & 156,273 (1,326 new🔺) deaths
- One week ago: 4,745,694 (51,568 new🔺) cases & 148,829 (1,176 new🔺) deaths
KS reports only M-W-F; CT and RI report only M-FWHO Situation report, 204
4 999 815 (47 964 new) cases and & 161 547 (558 new) deaths
- One week ago: 4 629 459 (47 183 new) cases & 154 226 (469 new) deaths
🌎 11 August
Johns Hopkins interactive dashboard (11.00 pm Pacific)
Global: 20,284,882 (195,258 new🔺) cases & 741,126 (4,935 new🔺) deaths
- One week ago: 18,540,119 (257,911 new🔺) cases & 700,647 (6,953 new🔺) deaths
* 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 that it was not released intentionally. Although early reports tied the outbreak to a market in Wuhan, China, analyses of genomic data have suggested that the virusdeveloped elsewhere.
⓷ Recommendations
🤓 Recommended reading
‼️ The ventilation system on a NY subway is amazing. An interactive story.
What happens to viral particles on the subway? NY Times, 10 August 2020.
Winter means cold and flu season, which is all but sure to complicate the task of figuring out who is sick with Covid-19 and who is suffering from a less threatening respiratory tract infection… Unless Americans use the dwindling weeks between now and the onset of “indoor weather” to tamp down transmission in the country, this winter could be Dickensianly bleak, public health experts warn.
Winter is coming: Why America’s window of opportunity to beat back Covid-19 is closing. STAT News, 10 August 2020.
“One of the biggest differences between this virus and [the 1918] influenza is the duration,” said John Barry, author of “The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History.”
With coronavirus, he said, the incubation period is longer, patients with symptoms tend to be sick longer, and many take longer to recover. Barry said leaders did not make sufficiently clear early on the simple epidemiological truth that this would be a painfully drawn-out event.
With no end to the pandemic in sight, coronavirus fatigue grips America. Washington Post, 11 August 2020.
🎦 Recommended viewing
Although the Wall Street Journal is paywalled, this eight-minute lead-in video is not. You can’t skip the short ad, though. Please watch, then contact your alma mater.
I think about the stadium the same way I think about nursing homes, cruise ships, jails and prisons. It’s among the highest risk areas.
~Dr. Peter Chin-Hong, Infectious disease physician, UCSF
Why Stadiums Are Incubators for Coronavirus Spread. WSJ, 10 August 2020.
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🍷🗽🌵☆ ⛱ 🍎 🍒 🍊🏇🏼 🦘💰🧵🇬🇧🔺🔻✈️ ⚾️🎲
⓸ Politics, economics and COVID-19
🦠 Half ofAmericans now know someone who's tested positive for COVID-19. “The coronavirus is becoming reality for most people and it will only increase,” said Cliff Young, president of Ipsos U.S. Public Affairs.
💰 The UK has reported its biggest job losses since 2009.
✅ About 4-in-5 chief executives expect remote work to become more widespread. About time. Predicted ripple include reduced rents and an urban exodus for quality of life.
❌ Business is booming for dialysis giant Fresenius. It took a $137M bailout anyway.
🆘 Children have symptoms, fatigue for months after falling ill.
⓹ 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)