March 25 US Confirmed Coronavirus Cases
Wednesday was not a good day. After a slowdown in the growth of reported cases on Tuesday we saw the numbers move up again, bringing us to almost 70,000. This means that today (Thursday) will see us pass up Italy in total number of cases, and very likely China, too. That would put us in first place. Mr. Trump, I'm tired of winning now.
On a percentage level we've seen new cases at a rate 31.5% of all previous cases on Monday, then only up 20% on Tuesday (where the actual number dropped from Monday's total as well), then up to 25% of the previous day's total cases on Wednesday.
The big good news from Tuesday (the drop in number of new infections), then, was probably a blip. And the big bad news (the first day of 200+ fatalities, only two days after the first day of 100+ fatalities), was not. Wednesday saw us get with 250 new fatalities, meaning we now have had over 1,000 deaths from coronavirus. That feels like a lot. In the grand scheme of things, it is not a lot... yet. But here's the important fact, and one you can relay to that annoying fb friend who is a know-it-all* who tells you this is nothing compared to the flu. Well, the current CDC estimate is that somewhere between 23-59,000 people will die in the 2019-20 flu season. The midpoint of that number is 42,000. If Covid-19 deaths increase 20% per day for the next 20 days, we will exceed that number. If the growth rate is higher, at 25%, we will exceed that number in 16 days. The fatalities growth rate for the last 5 days has been 26.6%, 34.3%, 27.7%, 34.5%, and 31.3%, if you carry those numbers forward we pass the expected flu cost in two weeks. And one last thing to tell your know-it-all* friend, Coronavirus has a 10-14 day incubation period, which means we are looking at the past. Even if we could stop it all today, we would still have growth for 10-14 days. So start making Easter plans via livestreaming.
* As in, "I know it ALL because I saw it on Fox News"
Here is my graph. I am eliminating the first day as more than 7 days worth of columns is hard to read. As a reminder, I am showing the progress over 1 week of the rate of infections (columns) per 100,000 residents, counting the number of states who have infections rates in each column's range. Each column represents a doubling of the infection rate of the column to its left.
Now let's look at the states:
Things to note:
I'm almost hesitant to say anything about these numbers, or even post them, and the reason is that I don't feel the data collection on them is at all of any quality. But it's all we have to go on, and I'm optimistic that the quality of the data will improve. That said, there are some things worth talking about:
And now let's zoom in on the counties:
Notes:
On a percentage level we've seen new cases at a rate 31.5% of all previous cases on Monday, then only up 20% on Tuesday (where the actual number dropped from Monday's total as well), then up to 25% of the previous day's total cases on Wednesday.
The big good news from Tuesday (the drop in number of new infections), then, was probably a blip. And the big bad news (the first day of 200+ fatalities, only two days after the first day of 100+ fatalities), was not. Wednesday saw us get with 250 new fatalities, meaning we now have had over 1,000 deaths from coronavirus. That feels like a lot. In the grand scheme of things, it is not a lot... yet. But here's the important fact, and one you can relay to that annoying fb friend who is a know-it-all* who tells you this is nothing compared to the flu. Well, the current CDC estimate is that somewhere between 23-59,000 people will die in the 2019-20 flu season. The midpoint of that number is 42,000. If Covid-19 deaths increase 20% per day for the next 20 days, we will exceed that number. If the growth rate is higher, at 25%, we will exceed that number in 16 days. The fatalities growth rate for the last 5 days has been 26.6%, 34.3%, 27.7%, 34.5%, and 31.3%, if you carry those numbers forward we pass the expected flu cost in two weeks. And one last thing to tell your know-it-all* friend, Coronavirus has a 10-14 day incubation period, which means we are looking at the past. Even if we could stop it all today, we would still have growth for 10-14 days. So start making Easter plans via livestreaming.
* As in, "I know it ALL because I saw it on Fox News"
Here is my graph. I am eliminating the first day as more than 7 days worth of columns is hard to read. As a reminder, I am showing the progress over 1 week of the rate of infections (columns) per 100,000 residents, counting the number of states who have infections rates in each column's range. Each column represents a doubling of the infection rate of the column to its left.
Now let's look at the states:
Things to note:
- Louisiana is getting really bad (and that's almost all Orleans and Jefferson Parrish), passing Washington State to be the third-highest rate of infection in the country.
- My suspicion that Washington is a success story continues to be reinforced. They seem to be doing a good job of slowing down the rate of new infections, which grew at a rate of just over 5% on Wednesday.
- Pay attention to Massachusetts. While Connecticut and Michigan also had big surges, Massachusetts new case numbers were up almost 60%!
How are the states doing on testing?
I'm almost hesitant to say anything about these numbers, or even post them, and the reason is that I don't feel the data collection on them is at all of any quality. But it's all we have to go on, and I'm optimistic that the quality of the data will improve. That said, there are some things worth talking about:
- The first thing that screams out at me is what the hell is going on in California? The number of reported tests DROPPED from 27,654 to 18,329! How? I'm not really sure, but there are two hints: One is that the data for California has not actually been updated since Tuesday afternoon, and the other is that there are 48,600 tests whose results are PENDING (California being one of the few states to reveal the number pending). So one presumes there was an error somewhere, that may have involved pending tests being counted as "not positive" which may have been conflated with "negative". But the end result is that California has gone from an already inadequate 34th in testing with 70 tests per 100,000 to being 45th, right after Texas!, with 46 tests per 100,000 residents.
- Massachusetts increased the number of tests by over 40%. And increased the number of people testing positive by almost 60%. Which makes one wonder if the infection is actually not spreading so much faster, as awareness of the infection is increasing. This, if true, would be a good thing. A good thing for Massachusetts, at least, and a warning for lots of other states.
- Florida has increased its testing by 37%. That's pretty good, and I certainly hope they keep it up, because in every other way the state's response has been, well, the kind of response you'd expect from a "Florida Man".
And now let's zoom in on the counties:
Notes:
- Gunnison County, CO (where Crested Butte is) has crossed the 300 cases per 100,000 threshold. This is the level at which I estimated Italian hospitals had become overwhelmed, and needed to start rationing treatment for patients, a scenario which could lead to patients dying due to lack of treatment, rather than the severity of their case.
- Westchester is now at 0.5% of the population infected. I'm going to go on a bit of a rant, here. I have seen people (mostly NOT from New York, I'll point out) who have been posting on facebook their admiration for Gov. Cuomo, and wish that he'd run for president. I've been arguing that seeming a good "leader" in times of great challenge is actually quite easy. Want proof? Rudi Giuliani went from being widely perceived as a bully and violator of human rights to "America's Mayor" after 9/11. Why? Because he was seen walking around lower Manhattan in the immediate aftermath of the towers' collapse, heading towards the towers not away as everyone else was. But he was doing that because he had stupidly moved his Emergency Management office to the 7 World Trade Center building, despite the facts that it was after terrorists had already tried to destroy the World Trade Center and that the office was considered itself a potential terrorist target, and over the objections of his Emergency Management chief. The 7 World Trade Center building was heavily damaged by the collapse of the North tower, and collapsed itself later that evening, meaning that Giuliani was not heroically walking towards the crisis center but rather stupidly wandering around not knowing where to go. But that's not the image people created. Even Trump, who is being disastrous, is getting a boost, with 60% of Americans thinking he's doing a good job. But Westchester may actually be evidence that Cuomo is NOT doing a great job. I just happened to be listening to a podcast from 13 days ago (The Gist), in which the host interviewed someone living in New Rochelle. It reminded me of this situation, and made me think about it. When the news was announced, the impression was that things were getting serious. We initially thought New Rochelle was going to be quarantined. In fact, we were quickly told that, no, it was not a quarantine zone, it was a "containment zone". Large gatherings were banned, and a few schools closed. And no other businesses were affected, no movement in or out of the zone was restricted. On the day this "crisis situation" had been declared, the number of cases in all of Westchester County was 121. Two weeks later that number was almost 4,700. That represents a 30% daily growth in the number infected; the exact same number that would have been expected had no measures been taken. In other words, the "drastic measures" undertaken at New Rochelle were, in fact, way too little and had the effect of being worthless.
Now, I don't want to be unfair to Gov. Cuomo. The vast majority of people did not have a sense of how serious things were two weeks ago. The predictions existed, certainly, but to many they seemed outrageous, unreal, impossible (to too many they still do). But, by point of comparison, the schools in the ENTIRETY of Harris County were shut down one day later. To this day, 2 weeks later, the infection rate in Harris County is 1/4 of what it was in Westchester 2 weeks ago. Doing real action would have been incredibly unpopular, and incredibly difficult. It would also have been real leadership, worthy of these memes flowing around the internet. - This is really a note I should have put in yesterday. The New Jersey counties are a bit misleading, as more than 20% of the cases are not assigned to any county. It doesn't dramatically change the rankings of the counties, though you can assume the infection rates are 20% worse than they appear.
My top 10 list for the most affected locales:
- New York City.
- Ski Resort Towns in Colorado and Utah.
- New Orleans
- Dougherty County, GA
- Seattle
- Bartow County, GA
- Detroit
- Albany
- Boston
- Milwaukee
Milwaukee has replaced Nashville, which has dropped quite a bit. Next on the list would be DC, Denver, and Chicago. Silicon Valley would probably be 14th.
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