Note: for my previous diary that tracks COVID over the past 6 months, see: www.dailykos.com/…
Where were we in October 1? Below is a plot of the 7 day moving average of new daily cases per 100k population. You should be able to see that orange is 10-24 cases per 100k, red is 25-49 cases per 100k, and dark red is 50+ cases per 100k.
On October 1 you can clearly see the high cases in the upper Midwest and Wisconsin, but there were also reds in many other states. However, the northeast is fairly quiet. One red area in PA is Centre County, home to Penn State.
Let’s see what happened 2 weeks later:
More states are now covered in orange, and many orange counties have started to turn red. Most of North and South Dakotas are now deep red.
So have we turned the corner in the next two weeks?
Certainly not. To quote Dr. Fauci, “We’re in for a whole lot of hurt.”
COVID is spreading back into the Northeast. All of Florida, and most of the Southeast is now covered in orange, with red areas certainly increasing. The upper Midwest is also almost all dark red.
This is the story that should be covered on the news, and on Chris Hayes, Maddow, Last Word and other outlets.
Is there any good news?
Yes, seasonal flu activity is still well below average:
Also, patient outcomes have improved.
The above charts from the COVID Tracking project shows that while the second wave over the summer was almost twice the number of daily cases as the first wave, hospitalizations were almost the same, and new deaths were ~50% lower.
However, it seems unlikely that this third wave - more than twice the number of daily cases as the second wave — will avoid seeing more hospitalizations and higher deaths. Deaths after a spike in cases lags around 4 weeks.
The first wave saw limited treatment options and most hospitals were trying to throw the kitchen sink at people to keep them alive. That contributed to better patient outcomes.
Other contributing factors include:
- Better protections and procedures in long-term care facilities for elderly folks
- Change in population — younger people. School-aged children usually get viruses from one of two sources: other children/staff at school, and parents bringing a virus home from work. These avenues were effectively shut down in the spring and summer, and there spread is still limited in hybrid learning environments. As more schools contemplate returning to in-person, and more businesses evaluate returning workers back to the office, these cases could increase even more.
Thanksgiving could also cause a spike in cases, but there is about a 2-week lag in seeing the spikes after an event.