COVID-19 Map worldwide, with statistics

[ronsatspokane]

Standard in math and science, because a linear scale is unreadable at the low end of a logarithmic curve, and it's simpler to extrapolate a straight line than a logarithmic function plotted on a linear scale.

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Thank you New York.

 

[Toby Bradshaw]

Thank you New York.

Soon we'll be able to say the same about New Jersey, Michigan, Florida, Illinois, Massachusetts, and Louisiana (at least). The big metro areas are already following New York's path, just delayed by a week or two.

 

[ronsatspokane]

Soon we'll be able to say the same about New Jersey, Michigan, Florida, Illinois, Massachusetts, and Louisiana (at least). The big metro areas are already following New York's path, just delayed by a week or two.

Not so sure about that. The leaders of New York are a special kind of stupid. Encouraging the population to go out to dinner, a movie and insuring people that riding the subway was not a problem just as the virus was blooming across the US. My state, where all of this started, has not exploded the way New York has. There were zero cases in New York when it turned up in Washington. Washington is currently at about 3000 cases. New York, 39,000. Idiots in charge are the root of the problem:

https://www.foxnews.com/media/tucker-carlson-nyc-leaders-endangering-public-coronavirus

 

[SGK]

I think that's highly debatable. Population density is important in a virus crisis.

But much more importantly, I hope New York's death rate trajectory doesn't show where the US as a whole will end up. The rate of increase in deaths in New York is tracking at the fastest rate of any subnational region tracked by the FT - way ahead of Lombardia which was the canary in the coal mine for the Western World.

https://www.ft.com/coronavirus-latest

 

[Toby Bradshaw]

The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington is forecasting >80,000 deaths from COVID-19 in the U.S. by mid-June. [95% UI 38K-160K]

https://covid19.healthdata.org/projections

No seasonal flu has killed more than 61K Americans in the past decade.

Full disclosure: Until 9 months ago I was the Chair of the Biology Department at the UW, so I have a lot of confidence in the IHME. YMMV.

 

[ronsatspokane]

I think that's highly debatable. Population density is important in a virus crisis.

But much more importantly, I hope New York's death rate trajectory doesn't show where the US as a whole will end up. The rate of increase in deaths in New York is tracking at the fastest rate of any subnational region tracked by the FT - way ahead of Lombardia which was the canary in the coal mine for the Western World.

https://www.ft.com/coronavirus-latest

But it is not just in the city within the state of New York. Long Island is infested and 6000 cases in Westchester alone. It may be the result of people fleeing the city or it may be public transportation related or it may be officials encouraging people to get out and party like it's 1999.

 

[SGK]

Of the 3 options you listed I would weight the first one the most. They also fled to Florida. (Just as wealthy Asians fled to Europe at first and then back again when Europe became the hot seat.)

Guys, no one has a crystal ball on this. A lot of things are shifting quickly. Estimates as to how infectious the virus can be are being raised, social distancing and other non-pharmaceutical interventions are yielding results, the hunt is on for treatment solutions and eventually a vaccine etc. Countries are hopefully using the time to better equip their healthcare resources.

I'm just glad that more people, including more people here, are taking this seriously and not scoffing that it's no big deal because (as of today) there have been less deaths than from a typical 'flu season.

Stay well. And hang in there - this isn't going to be just a 1-2 month thing.

 

[SGK]

Some interesting revisions in the numbers.

Neil Ferguson of Imperial College London is an epidemiologist and has dramatically revised his death estimate downward. Initially he got a lot of attention when he said that an uncontrolled spread of the virus could cause up to 510,000 deaths in Britain and up to 2.2 million deaths in the U.S. Now he is saying the number of deaths in Britain likely won't exceed 20,000 and could be much lower, and half of those people would have died this year regardless because they were so old and sick already. He also said the virus will peak in 2-3 weeks and credits the lockdown Britain implemented. He thought the lockdown would take two weeks or more to be effective, but it took two days.

BTW this is a superb example of what I will call twisted reporting. In giving testimony at the parliamentary select committee Neil Ferguson didn't revise much of anything except to increase the estimation of the rate of transmission of the virus. The "won't exceed 20,000 and could be much lower" was IN THE ORIGINAL REPORT and was a direct conclusion from their estimation of the impact of the NPI. Nothing new here. No change to forecasts. No backtracking.

 

[skeeljc]

Here is a good video that explains the mechanics of COVID-19

 

[INTJ]

BTW this is a superb example of what I will call twisted reporting. In giving testimony at the parliamentary select committee Neil Ferguson didn't revise much of anything except to increase the estimation of the rate of transmission of the virus. The "won't exceed 20,000 and could be much lower" was IN THE ORIGINAL REPORT and was a direct conclusion from their estimation of the impact of the NPI. Nothing new here. No change to forecasts. No backtracking.

The twisted reporting happened when the media and politicians set the narrative with the extremely unlikely worse case scenario, and even Dr Ferguson let that run for a while. It is in their best interest to do so. Sensationalism sells news, politicians use the crisis for the pet projects and pet causes, and things are easier for the healthcare system if everything is locked down.

That is the kind of BS that has earned extreme skepticism and disdain from me and many others. Even if the federal government had given no mandate on shutting things down, the people and places most at risk would have taken this seriously, restricted their activities, and taken precautions--like has happened with past epidemics and like many I know always do.

Like Dr Birx pointed out, "the predictions of the model don't match the reality on the ground in China, South Korea, or Italy.........so when people start talking about 20% of a population getting infected, it's very scary, but we don't have the data that matches that based on our experience."

Models not matching reality qualifies as another "no s--t Sherlock" moment. Anyone that has any experience with modeling and forecasting knows they are always wrong, it's just a matter of the magnitude of error. When there is a political competent to it, like most everything nowadays, that separation between the model/forecast and reality is significant.

Now I am not saying that we shouldn't have taken many of the actions we have taken, but there was a better way to deal with this that wouldn't have killed the economy and expanded the nanny state. Maybe next time the healthcare system will be better prepared and the FDA won't be such a bureaucracy. From what I can tell so far, if testing had started much sooner, people were tracked, and quarantines were targeted; we would have moved through this sooner with less infections and deaths.

Sadly, the way this has been handled--and most of the fault lies with the media--will not make people more likely to follow guidelines for the next epidemic. Less people will be like me and say "I know what you are doing is overly cautious, but I will comply for now so you can get your act together and develop a better plan" They will just ignore the guidelines completely. After all, the Arctic should have been melted by now............................

 

[Toby Bradshaw]

Now I am not saying that we shouldn't have taken many of the actions we have taken, but there was a better way to deal with this that wouldn't have killed the economy and expanded the nanny state. Maybe next time the healthcare system will be better prepared and the FDA won't be such a bureaucracy. From what I can tell so far, if testing had started much sooner, people were tracked, and quarantines were targeted; we would have moved through this sooner with less infections and deaths.

Not only did the U.S. know that the strategy you describe was the best plan, the CDC taught the South Koreans how to implement it when they sought advice following the SARS epidemic. Then we got to watch China and South Korea use the strategy successfully to bring their COVID-19 case loads under control.

The sad (and ongoing, even at this late date) story of the testing failure in the U.S. has been well documented. I've posted this link before. Of the western countries, Germany has done by far the best job of testing, and it shows in their lowest-in-the-world fatality rate. They offered tests to the U.S., but we declined -- a combination of "not invented here" and FDA foot-dragging.

This is how far behind we were as of 20 March.

 

[SGK]

and even Dr Ferguson let that run for a while.

Actually he was very quick to pick up the distortions of his testimony in elements of the UK and US press and felt the need to offer clarifications via his Twitter account. There was a very good article on this in, again, today's FT (the Alphaville section). One of the good things I guess about quality, global financial news reporting is they know their audience is more likely to call BS on poor quality.

I do agree that news reporting - and politics - in this country is in a sorry state. As I've said before, sometimes however you get what you ask for. While everyone's sitting at home in lock-down I highly recommend the HBO series The Newsroom.

As NZ would like to say:

 

[spclark]

https://www.foxnews.com/world/who-chief-tedros-questionable-past-coronavirus

I’ve been waiting for this to surface since I read early last week about Ghegreyesus‘ history and his prior relationships with China, in that they’ve been a major financial benefactor to his Ethiopian homeland.

Some kinda Quid Pro Quo there maybe? That put the entire world at risk while China plays mum about what they’ve let escape?

 

[SGK]

BTW in case you hadn't noticed, if you click on the sources here https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/ for each state you get more detail for each state, including county data, age distribution and % hospitalization etc. For example for Florida:

https://fdoh.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/8d0de33f260d444c852a615dc7837c86

 

[INTJ]

Actually he was very quick to pick up the distortions of his testimony in elements of the UK and US press and felt the need to offer clarifications via his Twitter account. There was a very good article on this in, again, today's FT (the Alphaville section). One of the good things I guess about quality, global financial news reporting is they know their audience is more likely to call BS on poor quality.

I do agree that news reporting - and politics - in this country is in a sorry state. As I've said before, sometimes however you get what you ask for. While everyone's sitting at home in lock-down I highly recommend the HBO series The Newsroom.

As NZ would like to say:

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Powerline quickly posted the correction as well. Powerline is the best conservative leaning source of opinion I have found so far. They try to be honest, objective, and factual.

Interestingly, as I note my intense irritation of the media, a CYA political class, and my increasing preference for less government; I realize that I am starting to sound just like those old guys I used to roll my eyes at. I will very soon be at Version 6.0. Is this just going to get worse the more I upgrade?

 

[WIB3]

Just got home from the grocery store here in south east Pa. OMG, nothing much on the shelves. Been to the same store forever, but today there was a noticeable difference. I’m always looking for the best in mankind but unfortunately I have a family. We have stocked up on the essentials, but there has been a change in humidity. I’m worried but also prepared. Don’t let the media give you a false sense of security, they are doing their best but let your own eyes lead you though this troubled times.

 

[Immike]

Everyone has been exceptionally polite to each other in my area

 

[SGK]

In the last two weeks I've been to the supermarket 4 times. The last visit was surreal with a queue outside - everyone spaced out - at 9am as they only let a limited number of people into the store (1 out, 1 in). Many people were masked up even though it offers you little to no protection. (The guy in front of me at checkout couldn't even keep his mask sitting over his nose.) I wasn't able to buy TP on any of those visits. I have 5 rolls left at home. On my last trip I "scored" the last 3-pack of paper towels in the store. It felt really weird to think like I'd grabbed some gold dust. Still couldn't buy any eggs either.

I should have worn my urban biking mask:

 

[Laurie]

@SGK you're about where we were in the UK maybe two weeks ago re the shelf shortages and one week behind in the customer numbers management. We've also got purchase limits on high demand goods. If you follow our pattern, eggs will return to stock fairly quickly and some paper products' availability (but not TP) will ease. Hand sanitisers, soaps, liquid soap dispensers, Paracetamol are also still sold out within an hour of shop openings despite one-item per customer purchase limits. Some tinned foods (eg tomatoes) and most pasta remain in short supply and/or unobtainable depending on the time we shop.

We now have police checkpoints stopping private cars and asking where the occupants are going and why to see if the reasons match any of the four relaxations given from staying on your own property (essential food / pharmaceuticals shopping; to/from work for key workers that can't be done at home; booked medical consultations although most of those are now being done over the telephone; one hour per day for outdoor exercise in your neighbourhood as long as separation isn't compromised and you cannot drive any distance to get there). If they don't you're turned back as has started to happen to people with campervans heading out of cities into rural or seaside regions.

As you can see under this regime, there is now no shooting here outside of your backyard and precious few can do that except maybe with a low-power airgun. Every non-military UK range is closed and the latter are closed to civilians with even the forces cancelling all on-range activity except for 100% essential training such as for units deploying to combat zones.

 

[SGK]

Hey, at least you don't have the Army Reserve going door to door in Hampshire hunting for Londoners!!