On the same day that Donald Trump sent his followers to capture the Capitol and threaten the lives of lawmakers in an attempt to overthrow the nation, COVID-19 killed over 4,000 American in a single day. The 4,100 who were tallied at WorldOMeters by the end of Wednesday was, by far, a new record. That record held all the way until Thursday, when 4,200 died. Thursday also brought 261,000 new cases in a single day, also a new record.
As Trump focuses on nothing but encouraging violence and protecting his own fading power, it appears that the federal government is giving zero attention to the crisis that has now killed 375,000 Americans. Nothing is being done to address the inadequate testing. Nothing is being done to provide guidance on the increased need for masks and social distancing. Nothing is being done to address the stumbling efforts to roll out vaccines. Nothing is being done to address bulging hospitals. Right now, the results of a New Year surge, on top of a Christmas surge, on top of a Thanksgiving surge are becoming clear. And those results are written in blood.
Numbers at the COVID Tracking Project are a little different … but not particularly better. They also have the nation with record levels of new cases, record levels of daily deaths, and a level of testing still far below where it was before the holidays. But most of all, they show coronavirus-related hospitalizations continuing to go up at an almost unbelievable rate. States from Alabama to Wisconsin are at record levels of hospitalization … and there aren’t many exceptions in that sequence.
It’s difficult to single out a specific “hot spot” in a nation that’s at red-hot levels of disease almost everywhere. However, two of the states that were hit hard in the summer, Texas and Arizona, are again shuffling to the front by almost any statistic. ABC News calls Arizona the “hottest hot spot” as the almost 10,000 new cases and 300 deaths there on Thursday are terrifying on a national level. But it’s more than just a bad day for the state.
“The state currently has the highest seven-day average of COVID-19 infections per capita of any region in the world, based on Johns Hopkins University data.”
Incredibly, there are so many people in ICUs on breathing assistance at this point that plain old oxygen is in short supply across the nation. Earlier this week, paramedics in Los Angeles were told not only to refuse rides to patients who were unlikely to survive, but to restrict their use of oxygen to only the most severe cases.
NBC News reports this problem is also affecting other areas, including El Paso, Texas, and the hard-hit Navajo Nation. Even though oxygen is present in every breath of air and can be concentrated directly from the atmosphere. doing so takes time and equipment. It also needs infrastructure for storage and transportation. The demand for the gas is, at the moment, simply overwhelming standard suppliers in the same way that hospitals are being overwhelmed.
Where possible, it’s infinitely better to assist patients in breathing by providing an enriched level of oxygen rather than through intubation. Intubation is horrifying, debilitating, and difficult to maintain for an extended period without causing damage to the patient. It’s also much more difficult than giving assistance through oxygen.
Arizona may be topping world charts, but it’s not just the United States being hit by the latest surge. Hospitals are full across the nation of Lebanon. The fast-spreading new variant continues to literally plague London.
Meanwhile, distribution of vaccine continues to lag. As The New York Times reports, small numbers of doses have been thrown away several times as vaccination programs haven’t been able to unite vaccine with those who need it. Hundreds of doses have been unused in freezers even as front-line workers and elderly patients go without. Much of the confusion comes from a single reason: Without federal guidelines on how the vaccine should be distributed, the rules have come down to states, counties, and cities—some of which have set conflicting regulations.
There has been some good news. Pfizer has indicated that their vaccine appears to be effective against the new fast-spreading U.K. variant. This likely also applies to the Moderna vaccine, which targets the same spike protein.
But the urgency of getting vaccines out and getting the virus load down is being made ever more critical as variants appear. Laboratory studies have already shown that the SARS-CoV-2 virus can continue to spread, and perhaps spread more effectively, even if the spike protein is altered so much that current vaccines no longer work. Another new, more contagious strain is spreading in—and from—South Africa.
In the last week, a coronavirus task force report warns that there may be another fast-spreading strain … in the United States. And that report makes it clear that vaccines need to be given now rather than later.
"Do not delay the rapid immunization of those over 65 and vulnerable to severe disease; recommend creation of high throughput vaccination sites with use of EMT personnel to monitor for potential anaphylaxis and fully utilize nursing students. No vaccines should be in freezers but should instead be put in arms now; active and aggressive immunization in the face of this surge would save lives."