Ok, we had a zoomer yesterday. Think I predicted that; think I predicted 2k+, no? 2,546, which is a 55% increase where the other day it was a 51% decrease that merited, in my opinion, an all caps lede. Reporting lag, reporting catch-up, that's what happens when you rely on volunteer reporters and collators. "Hello, this is Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, is Eddie there?" "Nuh-uh, he called in sick today."
Think I predicted a spike in Cases reported to over 210k for Tuesday, too. Was not as far off there. 215,724.
The above are why the NYT 7-day average and 14-day change figures are so much more important. So, to them:
The 14-day. It's bad, man.
+18 % Cases
+22 % Hospitalizations
+39 % Deaths
So, do you know personally anybody who has died of coronavirus? Probably not. Only 0.088% of the U.S. population has died of it. Another way of looking at it is that more have died than currently live in Plano, TX, the seventy-first biggest city in the U.S. Know anybody in Plano? Me neither. I do know, but by two degrees of separation though, two people who have died of the virus. How about who has gotten it? Much better odds there, 4.69%, 15,38M. Know anybody in Pennsylvania, New Mexico and Wyoming combined? Si, and I personally know two people, one who had it and got very sick, and one who has it and is doing fine so far. A third is the child of someone I know.
Anyway, the 7-day average lines:
Doesn't that look awful. The huge summer surge after a certain Individual One called on the states to "LIBERATE" and reopen looks like a terrain hazard on one of his golf courses now. And after he gave up we have the Matterhorn.
That's a curious damn graph. Looks exactly like a roller coaster. Never looked at the hospitalizations graph in the Times closely before. Yeah, it goes up where Cases go up and down where they go down. Makes sense, not so curious. It will surprise you not that hospitals in rural areas, where the virus is raging, are running out of ICU beds. We saw that most vividly in April. You don't see pictures of lines of patients being wheeled in on stretchers now like you did then because then it happened in New York City, now it's happening in Fargo, ND.
Man, much spikier, isn't it? Even graphed out over seven days the Deaths line is clearly more jagged compared to the rolly-polly of Cases and Hospitalizations. The averages on Dec. 7 (Dec. 1-7) and Dec. 6 (Nov. 30-Dec. 6) passed the previous seven day average high of April 17 for the first time.
Any way you look at it it's bad and getting worse. Merry X-mas.
