Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

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

After dobbs, women are no longer free.

Jack be nimble, jack be quick, hurry up and indict this prick.

I didn’t have alien invasion on my 2023 BINGO card.

It is possible to do the right thing without the promise of a cookie.

Jack Smith: “Why did you start campaigning in the middle of my investigation?!”

Found liable for massive fraud, is required to post a massive bond, gets a break, then files a *fraudulent* bond!

Why is it so hard for them to condemn hate?

Republicans: “Abortion is murder but you can take a bus to get one.” Easy peasy.

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

The new republican ‘Pastor’ of the House is an odious authoritarian little creep.

He imagines himself as The Big Bad, Who Is Universally Feared… instead of The Big Jagoff, Who Is Universally Mocked.

Not all heroes wear capes.

We still have time to mess this up!

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

Sadly, media malpractice has become standard practice.

“Just close your eyes and kiss the girl and go where the tilt-a-whirl takes you.” ~OzarkHillbilly

Republicans seem to think life begins at the candlelight dinner the night before.

Never entrust democracy to any process that requires Republicans to act in good faith.

“That’s what the insurrection act is for!”

They’re not red states to be hated; they are voter suppression states to be fixed.

I like you, you’re my kind of trouble.

There is no right way to do the wrong thing.

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

You are here: Home / Healthcare / COVID-19 / COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: Saturday/Sunday, Oct. 31 – Nov. 1

COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: Saturday/Sunday, Oct. 31 – Nov. 1

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50Comments

  1. 1.

    cbear

    Hey AL, I’ve been lurking for many years now, but still read BJ every day, and I just wanted to say THANK YOU so much for all the hard work you have put into the Covid Updates (as well as all your other posts)!

  3. 3.

    Mary G

    @Baud: That was my first thought – Fauci knows how to read all the rooms and knows America’s going to kick Twitler to the curb on Tuesday. He can tell the unvarnished truth. I wish he’d have done it earlier.

  5. 5.

    Debbie(Aussie)

    I too want to thank Anne for all the hard work she does putting these threads together. I feel a little bit knowledgeable, because of you, Anne. Many many thanks ?

  6. 6.

    rjnerd

    Unfortunately that paper from Stanford was by economists, not public health types.  Has methodological issues comparable to the Sturgis paper.  I had a friend, a professor of epidemiology and statistics give the quick rundown.   The premise is a valid one, but they misused a standard technique and the numbers are completely wrong.  Here is the writeup 

  7. 7.

    YY_Sima Qian

    Yesterday, China reported 3 new domestic confirmed cases, all at Shufu County in Kashgar Prefecture in Xinjiang “Autonomous” Regoon. all previously asymptomatic, have been under isolation. China reported 61 new domestic asymptomatic cases, 45 are reported by Shufu County in Kashgar Prefecture, all are traced close contacts already under quarantine. 16 of the new asymptomatic cases are reported by the Aktau County in Kizilsu Prefecture, which is adjacent to Shufu County. These cases are also traced close contacts or deemed at risk persons, already under quarantine. Apparently Kizilsu Prefecture started mass screening of all residents at the same time as Kashgar, the 1st round was completed on 10/27 and all results were negative. The 2nd round was completed yesterday. There are currently 54 confirmed (including 6 in serious condition) and 219 asymptomatic cases in Xinjiang.

    It is interesting seeing the evolution of the mass screening strategy in China over the months. During the 1st one at Wuhan at end of May, it was after the initial wave had already been suppressed for 2 months, to assess if there was still cryptic community transmission at very low levels. Therefore, it was only conducted once, using batch size of 5. During the Beijing outbreak in Jun., mass screening in Medium and High Risk districts only happened once, using batch size of 5, and it was pointed out at the time that such mass screenings would miss people early in the incubation period. By the time of Dalian and Ürumqi outbreaks in Aug., authorities were conducting repeated mass screenings of all residents in Medium and High Risk areas (Dalian used batch size of 3, unknown for Ürumqi), soon after community transmission had been detected. At Qingdao in mid-October, mass screening was only conducted once (using batch sizes of 5 – 10), since the nosocomial cluster was contained at the Pulmonology Hospital (one could argue that particular mass screening was unnecessary). Certainly the recent nosocomial infection of a nurse at the People’s No. 3 Hospital did not trigger mass screening at any level. With Kashgar (and Kizilsu, apparently), a mass screening was immediately ordered to determine if community spread had already occurred undetected (using batch size of 10), especially to urban Kashgar (which would then pose danger of spreading to the rest of Xinjiang and China). It does not necessarily make sense, strictly from cost benefit analysis point of view, to conduct a 2nd round of mass screening immediately after the 1st. Waiting 7 days for the most of the newly infected cases to become detectable might have been more efficient. However, Chinese authorities may have determined that the cost of repeated mass screenings is worth it if severe travel restrictions or lock downs (such as the one we saw in Ürumqi and much of the rest of Xinjiang in Aug. and early Sept.) can be avoided, as they are economically damaging, psychologically exhausting, and can create popular discontent. This time, only 4 sub-township units in Shufu County are deemed High Risk and have travel restrictions implemented. There are only distancing measures in urban Kashgar, such as limiting the number of shoppers at markets and bazaars at any given time. 

    China has built up diffuse RT-PCR testing resource at a massive scale, so the cost of testing is probably much lower due to economy of scale. Sample pooling further reduces cases by an order of magnitude. I would not be surprised if the key performance metrics mandated by the central government to regional authorities are high on minimizing COVID-19 outbreaks, minimizing popular dissatisfaction and maximizing economic recovery. A few tens of millions of yuans spent on mass screening that may not be strictly necessary will not draw scrutiny from Beijing, and minor inconvenience to the citizens. Beyond the direction impact epidemic control, mass screening also help assuage concerns by businesses and citizens, and thus help boost business and consumer confidence after an outbreak is suppressed and eradicated.

    Yesterday, China reported 21 new imported confirmed cases and 8 imported asymptomatic cases:

    • Lanzhou in Gansu Province – 7 confirmed cases, all Chinese nationals returning from Russia
    • Shanghai Municipality – 5 confirmed cases, 1 Chinese national each returning from the UAE (via Seoul Inchon), Spain (via Germany) and Argentina (via Schipol), a Belgian National coming from Belgium (via the UK), and an Israeli National coming from Israel (via Germany) and the US , and a Columbian national coming from Columbia (via Paris CdG)
    • Hohhot in Inner Mongolia – 3 confirmed case, no information released
    • Guangzhou in Guangdong Province – 3 confirmed cases, 2 Chinese nationals returning from Bangladesh and 1 from Zimbabwe; 4 asymptomatic cases, 3 Chinese nationals returning from Bangladesh, and 1 from Iraq
    • Foshan in Guangdong Province – 1 asymptomatic case, a Chinese national returning from Iraq
    • Xiamen in Fujian Province – 1 confirmed case, a Chinese national returning from Malaysia
    • Xi’an in Shaanxi Province – 1 confirmed case, a Chinese national returning from Pakistan
    • Chengdu in Sichuan Province – 1 confirmed case, a Chinese national returning from Greece; 1 asymptomatic case, a Chinese national returning from Canada
    • Nanning in Guangxi “Automomous” Region – 1 asymptomatic case, a Chinese national returning from overseas, no further information released
    • Chongqing Municipality – 1 asymptomatic case, a Chinese national returning from Nepal

    Today, Hong Kong reported 7 new cases, 1 from local transmission, without clear source of infection identified.

  9. 9.

    Chyron HR

    You have to understand, Asian societies have mystical Confucian Kung Fu powers that allowed them to comprehend the mystery of “cloth plus string” faster than the West.

    Maybe the FSB just doesn’t have enough practice making effective brainwashing memes in Chinese.

  10. 10.

    R-Jud

    I find myself getting snippy with headline writers and tweeter-ers claiming that BoJo has put “the U.K.” or “Britain” under lockdown starting on 5 November. He’s put *England* under lockdown. Wales is already doing its own thing and Scotland has had more strict controls in place this whole time.

    Now if you will excuse me, I am off to spend too much money at my local non-essential plant shop to help fatten up their reserves a bit before Thursday.

  13. 13.

    Ohio Mom

    Not Max:

    Not really on topic, and I haven’t followed the link yet, and I think this is more of a rhetorical question than what one I expect an answer to,
    but why are Hawaiian prisoners serving their time in Arizona?

  15. 15.

    mrmoshpotato

    Since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, many of Russia’s regions have been rocked by the shock of the extra spending needed to combat the virus — and a new debt crisis is looming

    Has anyone asked Vlad and the IRA if they’re better off today than they were 4 years ago?  Maybe they should vote on Tuesday.

    Oh wait…

  16. 16.

    YY_Sima Qian

    @Chyron HR: Russia is not likely to be stirring up sh*t in China, for a variety of reasons. Appearances and platitudes aside, Russia occupies the much weaker position in the burgeoning Sino-Russian partnership, they cannot afford to alienate Beijing, when relations with North America and Europe is at a nadir, and relationship with India is becoming less than solid. Furthermore, the CCP regime is very alert to any attempts at influencing the opinions of the Chinese population, it jealously guards that prerogative and is adamant at achieving monopoly. Any non-Mainland Chinese elements that attempt to stir things up in China via social media are more likely to come from Taiwan (which may or may not have any involvement at the government level) and Hong Kong.

  17. 17.

    yellowdog

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: Fauci is 79. I don think he needs the job. I think Trump has threatened to replace him with an anti-vaxer. By the way, Fauci (and Jon Bon Jovi) are paisans, literally. Our grandparents came from the same town in SW Sicily.

  18. 18.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Baud:

    Fauci believes the polls.  He’s ready to Biden. 

    I bidened on the 26th.  I hope the good doctor has already too.

  19. 19.

    mrmoshpotato

    Thank you for continuing to put together this daily digest for us AL.  And thanks for the daily, local updates from all of you jackals from across the oceans.

  20. 20.

    mrmoshpotato

    @Chyron HR: Also, maybe Asian societies act as, ya know, societies and not whiny brats whose freedumb is being attacked by face masks.

    “Waaaahhhhhh!!!!!  Face masks are tyranny!  Mah freedumbs are being violated!”

  22. 22.

    Amir Khalid

    Malaysia’s daily Covid-19 numbers. The Health Ministry reports 957 new cases today, for a cumulative reported total of 32,505 cases. The Ministry reports zero deaths, and the total stands at 249 deaths — 0.79% of the cumulative reported total, 1.15% of resolved cases.

    Meanwhile, 972 more patients recovered and were discharged today — a new record — for a total of 22,220 patients recovered — 68.36% of the cumulative reported total.

    Two new clusters were identified today: Usaha in Selangor, and Tembaga in Penang.

    All 957 new cases are of local origin. Sabah has 644 cases: 97 in older clusters, 401 close-contact screenings, and 146 other screenings. Selangor has 225 cases: 156 in older clusters, 16 in the Usaha cluster, 39 close-contact screenings, and 14 other screenings. Penang has 23 cases: 17 in older clusters, one in the Tembaga cluster, and six close-contact screenings. Labuan has 18 cases: 13 in existing clusters, and five other screenings. Terengganu has 15 cases, all in existing clusters. Sarawak has 11 cases: five in existing clusters, three close-contact screenings, and five other screenings.

    Negeri Sembilan has eight cases: two in existing clusters, four close-contact screenings, and two other screenings. Perak has five cases, all in existing clusters. KL has four cases, one in an existing cluster, and three close-contact screenings. Kedah has one case, in an existing cluster. Melaka has one case, in other screening. Johore has one case, in other screening. And Putrajaya has one case, a close-contact screening.

    Pahang, Perlis, and Kelantan reported no new cases today.

    10,036 active and contagious cases are currently in hospital; 97 are in ICU, of whom 27 are on ventilators.

  23. 23.

    Ken

    @Ohio Mom: why are Hawaiian prisoners serving their time in Arizona?

    I’ve noticed that quite often when something doesn’t make any sense, someone does make a profit.

  24. 24.

    Amir Khalid

    @R-Jud:

    The US-based news media doesn’t always take the trouble to get the US right, let alone the UK/Britain/England/Scotland/Wales/Northern Ireland.

  25. 25.

    NotMax

    @Ohio Mom

    Contracts with private prisons on the mainland as a response to lack of ample in-state facilities have been in place for quite some time. Not a topic I generally keep up with although I do remember reading some pretty gruesome stories about the same set-up with private prisons in Texas last century.

    Hawaii isn’t the only state to enter into such arrangements with the (makes me gag simply to type it) private prison industry.

  26. 26.

    Amir Khalid

    @Ohio Mom:

    it could be that the limited and expensive real estate supply on an island chain makes it cheaper to rent space in private prisons on the mainland, at least for inmates serving longer sentences.

  29. 29.

    JoyceH

    I don’t think Fauci made a political decision, but a medical decision. He would have given the same interview if Trump was coasting to re-election. Why? Because the pandemic is exploding and Trump is still running Doctor Death’s Traveling Coronavirus Show. Staying quiet and trying to make changes from the inside obviously isn’t working. He’s more trusted and popular than Trump. Speaking out now was the medically sound decision, regardless of the political landscape.

  30. 30.

    Robert Sneddon

    @R-Jud: Scotland now has a complicated five-level “tier” system that can supposedly be applied to various regions separately, an attempt to avoid a hard lockdown where they think it is not necessary (like the Highlands and Islands where small spread-out populations with limited access by outsiders aren’t suffering infection rates like the population centres in the Central Belt). It looks somewhat controlling and bitsy to me and I can see numerous ways it can go wrong but I’m not in charge of anything for which the rest of the observable Universe should be truly grateful.

    The two priorities of the Scottish government are to keep the health services functioning and able to meet demand during the current period of increased infections, and keep the schools open with 100% attendance. Everything else can take a number and wait.

    Right now the numbers of new cases in Scotland seem to be stabilising at about a thousand a day after starting to rise steeply about a month ago and with new tougher measures brought in about three weeks back. That’s still massively higher than it was in the summer when fifty new cases a day was cause for alarm and led to individually targetted restrictions for certain areas.

  31. 31.

    Jay

    Thank you again Anne, for these posts.

    They are essential to my survival.

    Thank you YY, Amir, Robert and others, who do local summaries and comments,

    expanding our knowledge and  information.

    Me, day 7 of  2nd back to back quarantine, 3 tests, no Covid, No symptoms. Sam however, tested positive, even though she never entered the RV or had close contact.

    7 more days to go, and as we enter the winter, SARS-Covid-19 restrictions are tightening up, but the public/corporate “manditory” rules, really arn’t and arn’t enforced.

    It’s not rocket science, no need to be “squishy”.

    It’s gonna be a bad winter, but good for Covid.

  32. 32.

    Brachiator

    New paper by economists, Doug Bernheim at Stanford & coauthors, shows the first 18 Trump rallies ended up increasing confirmed COVID cases by more than 30k, and probably added more than 700 deaths

    Trump supporters don’t care. They are “standing up” to the disease. Or lying down and dying. Either way, their love for Trump and their defiance keeps them going.

    They have achieved herd immunity to reality, if not immunity to the pandemic.

  33. 33.

    Another Scott

    @R-Jud: Yes, the framing is important, and getting it wrong is annoying.

    I’ve stopped reading and watching the BBC because of their relentless framing of the pandemic response as Teh Economy Versus Teh Virus.  It’s not.  The Economy won’t come back until the virus is defeated.

    Brave Leader BoJo doing a partial lockdown of England now isn’t a sign of Leadership or that the virus faction won in policy battles, it’s a sign that his people have not done enough to address the pandemic for months.  It’s the natural, predictable result because if you don’t effectively fight the virus then your hospitals get overwhelmed and death rates go through the roof…

    Will our governments learn the lessons?  I’m optimistic that Biden knows.  Does Starmer?

    Grrr…

    Cheers,

    Scott.

  35. 35.

    Brachiator

    It’s 2020 and half of American pundits still don’t know anywhere outside of North America and Europe exists.

    The other half don’t care.

  36. 36.

    Geminid

    Virginia was holding steady at ~1000new Covid-19 cases a day during August and September, and had dropped to 746 new cases one day before the number started rising in October. Friday, over 1400 new cases were reported, and yesterday the number was 1551. Northern Virginia continues to be hot spot, along with a prison heavy area southwest of Richmond, and poultry plant heavy Rockingham County. Infections are up in all the Virginia rural counties.

  39. 39.

    J R in WV

     

    All the news is pretty grim. Jay’s event especially so. Glad he and S. came upon that RV and was able to get help for the family therein before someone died.

    It is going to be a grim winter in a lot of places, no question about that.

  41. 41.

    Sloane Ranger

    Reporting from soon to be locked down England but covering the entire UK, here are yesterday’s figures.

    There were 21,915 new cases, down about 2000 from the day before. We have now broken the million mark, with 1,011,660 cases since the start of the pandemic. The new cases are located as shown below,

    England – 18,864 (down @2000)

    Northern Ireland – 649 (up @80)

    Scotland – 1101 (down @180)

    Wales – 1301 (down @400).

    The above figures should be taken with some scepticism as we’ve, once again, entered the weekend processing delay issue.

    Deaths – There were 326 deaths yesterday, up from 274 the day before). 278 deaths were in England, 11 in Northern Ireland, 24 in Scotland and 13 in Wales. The trend is upwards, as we’d expect.

    No testing report today, the figures won’t be updated until tomorrow.

    Hospitalisations – 10,918 people were in hospital on Thursday, 29th October and 978 were on ventilators on Friday, 30th.

    General – If we take the figures on face value, the upwards trend in new cases seems to stabilised although there’s no sign of it reducing. I can only assume people more knowledgeable that me in epidemiology and virology and more competent with statistics have noticed something I haven’t or BoJo hopes to get the figures down enough to let everyone have a “normal” Christmas before they spike again in mid-January as a result. Michael Gove has just said that the 1 month lockdown may be extended if the figures don’t come down enough. The Confederation of British Industries has called the lockdown “a bleak mid-winter” and the usual suspects are complaining about their “freedoms” on Twitter. One individual complained he couldn’t get a supermarket home delivery slot for weeks as everyone was panic buying. I, therefore, approached by own home delivery shopping experience this morning with trepidation but had no problem in getting a slot on Wednesday, although I had to take a delivery slot between 8 -9pm. I was even able to score 2 packs of toilet rolls containing 9 rolls each, the maximum allowed!

  43. 43.

    Another Scott

    Thanks from me too, AL, YY, Amir, and everyone.

    Relatedly…

    One of the men charged with conspiring to kidnap Gretchen Whitmer is asking to get out of jail. He's diabetic, and fears COVID-19

    https://t.co/0CyERGeZ8P— chris evans (@notcapnamerica) November 1, 2020

    His brain should be studied. This is a classic example of cognitive dissonance.

    (Recall that these idiots were planning to kidnap Witmer and “put her on trial” because she was trying to keep the population safe from COVID-19 via things like wearing masks.)

    (via NotLarrySabato)

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  44. 44.

    rjnerd

    @Brachiator: Unfortunately the analysis they did wasn’t correct.  their “new approach” was just an old one used incorrectly.  There is an effect, but the actual amount isn’t what they said.  I pinged a friend, who is an epi and stats professor, and you can read her reply here.

  45. 45.

    sdhays

    @Another Scott: Who says he’s actually afraid of getting COVID-19? I think he doesn’t like prison (what a shock!) and his lawyer sees an opportunity to get him out.

    I really don’t understand the arguments for letting people out of prison due to COVID-19. Our culture is so sick that jokes about the horrible, horrible conditions in our prisons are mainstream, and have been for decades. People in prison are terrified of horrible things happening to them, including death, and we, as a society, don’t give a shit. So why do we all of a sudden care about people getting sick?

    It seems like just another loophole for certain people to use.

  46. 46.

    trollhattan

    The freshman kid has now been tested seven times at school since August (all negative, thank gawd) and it seems their protocols are working, with the caveat I do not know of a formal publicly available tally of all testing results. Surely there have been some positives between students and faculty.

    They’re sending the students off at Thanksgiving and they don’t return until winter term at the end of December, taking their fall semester finals remotely. We may inherit one of her fellow students for that period because she is facing returning to England, quarantining two weeks, then returning to California to quarantine two weeks before school starts again. Happy Christmas?

    My county’s (Sacramento) positive tally is ticking upward from the lows we saw just a few weeks ago, but nothing like the dramatic spike seen in many other places in the States. Suspect our lingering summerlike weather has a role, plus we never completely lifted controls. The mid-summer peak was an outcome of opening too many things, too quickly.

    Am afraid city schools won’t be able to open until next fall at the earliest. This generation of kids will be altered the rest of their lives because of the disruptions to their education and socialization. Thanks a lot, Donny.

  47. 47.

    Brachiator

    @rjnerd:

    Unfortunately the analysis they did wasn’t correct. their “new approach” was just an old one used incorrectly. There is an effect, but the actual amount isn’t what they said.

    I really appreciate your links and additions here.

    There is a BBC podcast “More or Less” about the use of statistics in media, that often notes corrections and nuances like this. Very good stuff.

  48. 48.

    Brachiator

    @sdhays:

    Who says he’s actually afraid of getting COVID-19? I think he doesn’t like prison (what a shock!) and his lawyer sees an opportunity to get him out.

    Prisons are social spaces that have been particularly vulnerable to the virus.  There were prisoners who were moved from one California prison with no Covid-19 who were moved to another prison with many cases, with predictably bad results.

    Inmates and prison staff deserve just as much consideration as anyone else with respect to the pandemic.

  49. 49.

    ns

    Thank you for doing these posts Anne, research aggregation gold. Thank you for being on Twitter so I don’t have to.

  50. 50.

    Debbie(Aussie)

    @Amir Khalid:

    sadly Amir, we have private prisons in Australia. Serco runs them, I believe. along with the most disgusting, human right abusing, against all UN refugee conventions, ‘boat people’ concentration camps. (Yes I hate our government) I have to stay ? or I would dissolve into tears or worse, depression sucks!

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