Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Tide comes in. Tide goes out. You can’t explain that.

If you are still in the gop, you are either an extremist yourself, or in bed with those who are.

He seems like a smart guy, but JFC, what a dick!

Roe isn’t about choice, it’s about freedom.

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

If you are in line to indict donald trump, stay in line.

The next time the wall street journal editorial board speaks the truth will be the first.

There are no moderate republicans – only extremists and cowards.

Only Democrats have agency, apparently.

‘Museums aren’t America’s attic for its racist shit.’

Washington Post’s Catch and Kill, not noticeably better than the Enquirer’s.

Proof that we need a blogger ethics panel.

You come for women, you’re gonna get your ass kicked.

It could be worse. Vance could have said “post-menopausal sows.” Waiting for that audiotape to surface.

Let us savor the impending downfall of lawless scoundrels who richly deserve the trouble barreling their way.

Everybody saw this coming.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

There are consequences to being an arrogant, sullen prick.

Bad news for Ron DeSantis is great news for America.

Hot air and ill-informed banter

If you’re pissed about Biden’s speech, he was talking about you.

People are complicated. Love is not.

This must be what justice looks like, not vengeful, just peaceful exuberance.

ha ha ha! Nice try weird people.

You are here: Home / Healthcare / COVID-19 / COVID-19 Coronavirus Update: Thursday/Friday, July 2-3

COVID-19 Coronavirus Update: Thursday/Friday, July 2-3

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Good (by current standards) news! — seldom been so happy to hear something was a hoax:

Reader Interactions

32Comments

  1. 1.

    Mary G

    I started following Carl T. Bergstrom before the pandemic because of his tweets about crows and ravens, but it turns out he’s also an epidemiologist. He had a thread today taking the CDC to the woodshed for refusing to require that colleges test incoming students if they’re having classes this fall:

    This recommendation from @CDCgov, coupled with the rationale given, beggars belief.

    This is thinest of absence-of-evidence arguments. pic.twitter.com/QdYy5HKl7E
    — Carl T. Bergstrom (@CT_Bergstrom) July 2, 2020

    I can’t venture to guess the motives of the CDC here. Maybe it’s mere incompetence rather than the ongoing slow-walk of testing. Hanlon’s razor strains. But this sure looks like the agnotology playbook: manufacturing enough doubt to justify inaction: https://ritholtz.com/2016/06/frightening-global-rise-agnotology/…

    Locally, things are going badly. Big jump in cases and hospitalizations again. I hate to see California lumped in with Florida, Arizona, and Texas. It’s fucking embarrassing.

  2. 2.

    Amir Khalid

    Malaysia’s daily numbers. Five new cases: two from local infection, both Malaysians being screened in hospital ahead of surgery; three cases from imported infection, all of them Malaysians returning from abroad. DG of Health Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah said at today’s media briefing that this is the fifth day in a row with a single-digit number of new cases. Cumulative total 8,648 cases.

    Nine more patients recovered and were discharged; total 8,446 recovered or 97.7% of the cumulative total. 81 active and contagious patients remain isolated in hospital; both patients in ICU are on ventilators.

    No new deaths; this is Malaysia’s 19th straight day without any Covid-19 fatalities. Total is still at 121 deaths. Infection fatality rate is 1.39%, case fatality rate is 1.41%.

    Dr Noor Hisham said that with the low number of new cases, the Ministry is now emphasising clinical surveillance, particular people presenting with influenza-like illness or severe acute respiratory infections, and active case detection among high-risk groups.

    He also griped that some private laboratories are not reporting negative results for their Covid-19 testing, which hampers the Ministry’s data collection.

  4. 4.

    OzarkHillbilly

    From Trump has ‘gone awol’ as president amid coronavirus pandemic, says ex-CIA director

    A poll by Hart Research for the pressure group Protect Our Care found that even voters who approve of Trump’s handling of the economy care more about his botched response to the virus. Some 57% believe that Trump’s policies are increasing the chances that many more people will die from the coronavirus, while only 17% believe they decrease it.

    Overall, the survey found, 60% of voters disapprove of how Trump has handled the coronavirus and 57% believe the president is to blame for the deaths associated with it.

  5. 5.

    Betty Cracker

    Florida broke yet another record yesterday with more than 10K new infections, but Pence was in town to visit Governor Slabhead and gargle Trump’s wizened balls:

    TAMPA — The coronavirus case numbers are worse than ever in Florida.

    But on Thursday, Vice President Mike Pence came to Tampa with a message for the Sunshine State: Florida is in a good position to weather the storm.

    “I want the people of Florida to know we’re in a much better place thanks to the leadership of President (Donald) Trump, the innovation of American industry and to the partnership that we’ve forged, not just in testing, but in personal protective equipment,” Pence said in an event with Gov. Ron DeSantis at the University of South Florida Center for Advanced Medical Learning and Simulation.

    He’s lying about everything, including PPE. My sister is a nurse anesthetist, and she and her colleagues from other facilities have to scrounge around and swap masks and other equipment since hospitals receive irregular shipments that tend to be all in one size, ensuring that only a third of the staff at any facility have equipment that fits.

    Every time I think I couldn’t despise the incompetent, lying, malevolent shit-stains who have thrust us into this hellish situation more, I read an article like this and become incandescent with rage again. Defeating these people at the ballot box will be a good start but not nearly enough.

  6. 6.

    Amir Khalid

    China, Japan, Korea, Vietnam, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines, Australia, and the European Union

    I don’t understand having this as a group for the purposes of comparing data. It seems completely arbitrary.

  7. 7.

    WereBear

    Yesterday Bloomberg Opinion was saying: “This won’t be like New York,” but I find their reasons specious and they completely miss the death toll angle, which I think will be higher.

    Here’s just ONE indicator:

    Diabetes Most Prevalent In Southern United States, Study Finds
    Date: September 25, 2009

    Summary:
    Diabetes prevalence is highest in the Southern and Appalachian states and lowest in the Midwest and the Northeast of America. Researchers have used two public data sources to investigate the prevalence of diagnosed and undiagnosed diabetes mellitus at the State level.

    There are so many reasons this finding has been consistent this entire century so far. Combine poverty, junk food, lack of medical care & sick leave with Republican overlords, and it’s a friggin’ perfect storm of conditions COVID-19 tends to rampage through. All the health markers of coronavirus complications create a perfect storm of metabolic dysfunction.

    And now we are hearing that the serious cases are trending younger …

  8. 8.

    Brachiator

    In the US, how people behave over the holiday weekend will help determine whether the increase in cases will intensify over the next four to five weeks.

    Here in California, especially, I will be looking to see whether people defy Governor Newsom’s orders to avoid bars and beaches, etc.

    But I have noted before that I am not certain whether state and local officials have been clear about the risk of community spread. People should stay home and if they party for the holidays, keep the parties small, maintain social distancing and wear masks where appropriate.

    It actually may have been better to let people go to the beach rather than stay home with friends and extended family members.

    If cases ramp up significantly in July and August, and hospitals get strained or overwhelmed, you might see colleges decide not to let students return to campus.

    Meanwhile, Trump is insisting that the virus will magically disappear. Not gonna happen.

  9. 9.

    Robert Sneddon

    @Amir Khalid: That grouping of nations (including the EU) comprises about a third of the entire world population. It’s a mixture of so-called First World and developing nations and they’re collectively doing better than the self-appointed Leader of the Free World which claims to be the most advanced nation on Earth in terms of health care and cohesive infrastructure, with only 5% of the world’s population.

  10. 10.

    Tony Jay

    Is it bad that I’m absolutely convinced that the only reason the British Government settled on July 4th as the date for reopening pubs, restaurants and hairdressers is so the Media can run with lazy ‘Independence Day’ headlines and the even lazier Prime Minister Johnson can rip off Bill Pullman’s speech?

    I don’t think it is. In fact, I’d bet good money the Downing Street propaganda trust just saw the synergy as appealing to their American mentors and planned accordingly.

  12. 12.

    Amir Khalid

    @Tony Jay: I’d delay reopening bars as long as I could. People with a few in them get sloppy about mask-wearing and social distancing. And what was that business about BoJo’s dad travelling to Greece without quarantining?

  13. 13.

    Brachiator

    @WereBear:

    Diabetes Most Prevalent In Southern United States, Study Finds

    Good catch. Diabetes seems to be a significant factor in cases where people become ill and have a serious risk of dying.

    People will need to follow hospitalizations and fatalities closely.

    Also, perhaps look for increases in hospitalizations in younger cohorts of patients.

  14. 14.

    Brachiator

    @Robert Sneddon:

    That grouping of nations (including the EU) comprises about a third of the entire world population. It’s a mixture of so-called First World and developing nations and they’re collectively doing better than the self-appointed Leader of the Free World

    If this is the case, they should have included New Zealand.

  15. 15.

    Brachiator

    @Tony Jay:

    Is it bad that I’m absolutely convinced that the only reason the British Government settled on July 4th as the date for reopening pubs, restaurants and hairdressers is so the Media can run with lazy ‘Independence Day’ headlines and the even lazier Prime Minister Johnson can rip off Bill Pullman’s speech?

    I thought that BoJo mishandled BREXIT. He is rising to new levels of incompetence in handling the pandemic. Worse, he seems to be lying about facts and figures, and has made some stupefying errors and omissions regarding the outbreak of the virus in Leicester.

    If he were intent on re-opening pubs, he should have done it one a weekday. He’s just asking for trouble. And he will probably get it.

  16. 16.

    Amir Khalid

    @gkoutnik:

    I guess a baby boom in nine months is better than the international upsurge in domestic violence that was being reported earlier, as husbands and wives found themselves in much closer proximity than they were used to.

  20. 20.

    Sloane Ranger

    @Brachiator:

     

    If he were intent on re-opening pubs, he should have done it one a weekday. He’s just asking for trouble. And he will probably get it.

    I agree with Tony Jay about 4 July being chosen for its headline value and what you say about going with a weekday is exactly what I was thinking. There’s the potential for another Bournemouth beach moment here.

    Some pubs have said they aren’t opening because they’re old and their internal design doesn’t lend itself to social distancing. One landlord was on the radio saying he was going to wait a month to see if there’s a spike before deciding whether or not to re-open as he doesn’t want to buy loads of beer only to have to throw it away if the numbers go up and the pubs have to close again.

    I’m thinking of masking up and going for a wander round the town centre tomorrow, just to see how many people are actually in the pubs.

  22. 22.

    prostratedragon

    @Mary G:
    Saw that horrifying CDC “guidance” yesterday, and hope the Bergstroms’ pushback finds some audience. There’s a prepended paragraph to the copy CTB linked that’s worthy of note:

    Note: This is the submitted version of a piece that was published in the Chronicle of Higher Education. The Chronicle cut key sections of our piece without our approval. By omitting our key criterion for reopening –that universities must first have a realistic plan for keeping R below unity –the published version weakens the messages we aimed to convey.

    [Disclaimer: Back in the Jurassic I was a student of Ted Bergstrom.]

  23. 23.

    Tony Jay

    @Amir Khalid:

    @Brachiator:

    Its all of a piece with this painted eggshell of a ‘Government’, where the only questions of note are where the incompetence ends and where the deliberate treason begins, and if that even matters given that the British Media will never, ever touch that narrative with a bargepole.

    Johnson’s wanker of a father shat all over the very clear rules because he could. No one is going to hold him to account, no one is going to demand he face actual punishment for it, because the important lesson here is that the rules don’t apply to the connected and rubbing that into the faces of the un-connected is as Johnsonian as burning a £50 in front of a homeless person, plus it furthers the unspoken aim of steering the national psyche towards ignoring whatever rules remain in place as an act of defiance along the lines of “Well if they can get away with it…..”

    This is how countries fall apart, with flags-a-waving all the way down.

  24. 24.

    Amir Khalid

    @rikyrah:

    Thank you. There is no magic trick to dealing properly with the pandemic. It takes effective governance, it takes letting the experts take the lead, it takes constant and consistent messaging to foster the social discipline that the public needs to play its part in fighting this pandemic. All the successful nations are doing these things, and none of them is really beyond US capabilities.

  25. 25.

    Robert Sneddon

    @Brachiator: The countries and regions mentioned all have large or very large populations — Vietnam has 97 million people, the EU over 450 million, China has 1400 million etc. New Zealand is doing a very good job of keeping the numbers down but it only has a population of 5 million or so so adding it to the list in the article doesn’t affect the proportions very much.

  26. 26.

    YY_Sima Qian

    Yesterday, Beijing reported 2 new domestic confirmed, 1 new suspect and 1 new asymptomatic cases. One of the confirmed case shipped at the Xinfadi exchange way back in 6/3, was identified as a close contact and placed under centralized quarantine in 6/16, developed symptoms on 6/28, sent to a hospital in 6/30, tested positive on 7/1. The other confirmed case was not directly connected to the Xinfadi exchange, developed symptoms on 6/13 but tested negative, self-quarantined at home until 6/21, when the case was identified as a close contact and placed under centralized quarantine.

    The asymptomatic case is causing quite a commotion on Chinese social media. The case is a young pregnant woman who for whatever reason stopped briefly at a check point at the Xinfadi exchange on 6/14, a day after the exchange was already closed. She went to a hospital to get tested in 6/15, tested negative. On 6/16 she developed symptoms of threatened abortion, was examined and treated at a hospital, then sent home for 14 days of self-quarantine. On 6/18, she developed COVID-19 symptoms and was sent to a hospital, but still tested negative. Her self-quarantine lasted until 6/29, but during that period she repeatedly ventured outside, tampering with the electromagnetic sensors placed on her apartment door by the authorities in doing so. She visited several Gynecology/Pediatrics hospitals, possibly for check ups. She visited her in-laws on 6/28.She visited a government office on 6/30. She was tested as part of community mass screening on 7/1, still tested negative. She went to get another test at a top hospital in Beijing on 7/2 (not sure why she decided to get tested again so soon after a negative result). This time (the 4th test), she tested positive. She was eating lunch in a restaurant at a major shopping mall when she was notified on the phone. She completely lost it and became hysterical. Passers by took videos of her distraught state, and it went viral. The videos show the shopping mall security guard trying to calm her down and coaxed her to the outdoor plaza by an entrance to the mall (and keeping others away), where she was picked up by an ambulance. The mall was immediately shut down, all shoppers had to line up to register their contact information before they could leave, and they will need to self-quarantine for 14 days. The restaurant was shut and disinfected. The shopping mall is also shut and will be disinfected. All services staff at the mall will be placed under centralized quarantine and tested. So far, 205 close contacts have been identified and placed under centralized quarantine. That is an astounding number close contacts for someone who should have been under self-quarantine.

    The case exposes several gaps in epidemic control in practice. How are electromagnetic sensors placed on the doors of those under self-quarantine so easily tampered? Clearly there is oversight in supervision of those under self-quarantine by the community workers. Someone under self-quarantine should have a yellow health code, how did she manage to exit her residential compound, enter her in-laws compound, and access multiple hospitals during her quarantine period? As someone at risk of a miscarriage, why was she wondering outside so often? Her medical condition might have required check ups at hospitals, but the community should have been able to make the necessary arrangements.

    Depending on the circumstances, violating quarantine (as well as other actions like lying to contact tracers) can subject one to arrest and prosecution under epidemic control laws. When the videos of her Learning of the positive test result first emergeS online, there was a lot of sympathy. Now the response is overwhelmingly that of anger and disgust.

    Given her brief and mild symptoms, it is possible she has self-healed, and tested positive now because she is shedding viral fragments.

  27. 27.

    YY_Sima Qian

    @Amir Khalid: The Asian countries were trained by the US CDC, after SARS. The irony…

    Responding energetically to pandemics (AIDS in Africa), as well as making detailed contingencies for such threats, are policies I have to credit the GWB administration for.

  28. 28.

    YY_Sima Quan

    The last of the asymptomatic cases identified during Wuhan’s mass screening in late May have been cleared and released from quarantine. Wuhan now no longer has any active cases, confirmed, suspect or asymptomatic.

  29. 29.

    Edmund Dantes

    Not that I want it to be higher, but I am finding the death toll dropping somewhat interesting.

    yes it’s a lagging indicator but Florida and Arizona have been in such a fast burn that I was expecting it to have started going the other way.

    is it the downward death trend in old hotspots being big enough to overcome increasing trend in new hotspots? Is it better knowledge of how to treat? Is it new hotspots haven’t outpaced medical facilities yet? Is this a calm before the storm? Etc?

     

    I am guessing it’s most likely a combination of all, but the breakdown is kind of key as to how screwed we are. Cause if it’s mostly lagging, old hotspots have slowed but new hotspots haven’t caught up, then we are about to hit a world of hurt worse than NY.

  30. 30.

    sdhays

    @Edmund Dantes: I recall reading that the current infections are tending to be in much younger people so far, which partly accounts for deaths not skyrocketing the same as infections.

    And WTF is wrong with people and their pathological desire to go the fucking bar? Just close the damn bars down for the rest of the year, dammit! You can still get your fucking alcohol; just feed your damn alcoholism at home for next several months. Create a government lifeline to keep the owners solvent and just stop fucking talking about opening the fucking bars anytime soon. I mean, fuck! Why don’t we all just flock to the hospitals and start licking toilet seats??

  32. 32.

    Tony Jay

    @The Lodger: 

    Far more people in Britain know that 4th July = Independence Day than know or care who the United States were celebrating their independence from.

    Hell. I’d bet more people have seen the film than know the history. We forgot about your treason a loooonnnnng time ago. Our current Government are just trading on familiarity with the holiday to brand “Get drunk and infected ASAP Day” as something a bit less in your face.

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