Straight to the point.
(Red = US counties where 10%+ of tests are positive, or there were 100+ new cases per 100K people over the past seven days). pic.twitter.com/t4EwiWqhLm
— ian bremmer (@ianbremmer) August 6, 2021
BREAKING: The U.S. is now averaging 100,000 new COVID-19 infections a day, crossing a milestone last reached during winter surge. https://t.co/m63DhPKzs1
— The Associated Press (@AP) August 7, 2021
Half of U.S. population fully vaccinated against COVID-19: CDC https://t.co/BS8PQHVnzM pic.twitter.com/VeNDgC6I5l
— Reuters (@Reuters) August 7, 2021
The US administered 821,000 vaccine shots today, bringing the total to 350 million, or 105.4 doses per 100 people. The 7-day moving average declined slightly to 694,000 shots per day, but has been very gradually rising. pic.twitter.com/FH4JGfvMeo
— Patrick Chovanec (@prchovanec) August 7, 2021
If you suffer from a #COVID19 breakthrough case, you will likely only have mild illness and not be hospitalized, but you could pass the virus on to others. This is why we updated our mask guidance recently. Learn more: https://t.co/IR303vv1Jf https://t.co/hj6cj9xmwv
— Rochelle Walensky, MD, MPH (@CDCDirector) August 6, 2021
New hospital admissions in the US due to COVID-19 are up a further +40.0% from a week ago. pic.twitter.com/4QpKv7Zlys
— Patrick Chovanec (@prchovanec) August 7, 2021
Tens of thousands of vaccinated people may catch Covid-19, but the majority will not fall severely ill — a testament to the efficacy of inoculations even against the Delta variant that has been fueling case surges across the US, a top health official says. https://t.co/s4sP4hl2w9
— CNN (@CNN) August 6, 2021
The US had +124,496 new confirmed cases of COVID-19 yesterday, the highest number since February 5, bringing the total to over 36.3 million. The 7-day moving average rose to 101,254 new cases per day. pic.twitter.com/xloQSGlCf1
— Patrick Chovanec (@prchovanec) August 7, 2021
Analysis | A key question is still unanswered: Will this surge in coronavirus cases be less deadly? https://t.co/PcSzbfSVRL
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) August 6, 2021
======
As the bodies pile high in low- & middle-income nations (LMICs).
This pandemic is going to last many more years; that is a choice that rich nations are making, by locking up the global supply of doses & blocking LMICs from making their own doses.
Locking & blocking. pic.twitter.com/wRWfBcmLTj
— Prof. Gavin Yamey MD MPH (@GYamey) August 6, 2021
Rolling out additional booster shots of #covid19 vaccines widely is no different than going for a second helping while there’s still a long line of people waiting to get any food at all.
And we’re not even sure whether that feeling in our stomachs is hunger – or just anxiety.— Kai Kupferschmidt (@kakape) August 6, 2021
Covid-19 latest updates: White House says 110 million coronavirus vaccines sent to over 60 countries https://t.co/IoZ2sIxjjf
— Mary Jordan (@marycjordan) August 3, 2021
Chinese President Xi Jinping pledged 2 billion doses of COVID-19 vaccines would be supplied to the world through this year, increasing China’s commitment as the largest exporter of the shots. https://t.co/j9JEkb5bP0
— The Associated Press (@AP) August 6, 2021
India approves J&J COVID-19 vaccine for emergency use https://t.co/jV4GwECU70 pic.twitter.com/UNMib6dEic
— Reuters (@Reuters) August 7, 2021
Philippines records near four-month high in daily COVID-19 cases https://t.co/W0yA33jYaq pic.twitter.com/mjNxMx70WY
— Reuters (@Reuters) August 7, 2021
Australia daily COVID-19 at 2021 record high with millions in lockdown https://t.co/mdDwAkbHh2 pic.twitter.com/I4ahU5VFui
— Reuters (@Reuters) August 7, 2021
Fatalities have surged in Russia as the Delta variant has swept across the country. Excess deaths since the start of the pandemic have now passed 531,000https://t.co/ZZLIuATe9r
— The Moscow Times (@MoscowTimes) August 6, 2021
Ignoring the moratorium: France & Germany will move ahead w/ booster shots, ignoring the WHO's call to hold off on 3rd shots until poorer nations received doses. The 2 European countries begin Covid boosters for older & other vulnerable people in September https://t.co/CvTBvU2Nf1
— delthia ricks ? (@DelthiaRicks) August 6, 2021
Africa Covid chief John Nkengasong says vaccine saved his life https://t.co/LfVq5xcC3W
— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) August 6, 2021
Brazil reports 42,159 COVID cases, 1,056 death in 24 hours https://t.co/aPL1zSzu7G pic.twitter.com/IXqeyDQTC3
— Reuters (@Reuters) August 7, 2021
Mexico posts 21,563 new COVID-19 cases, 568 more deaths https://t.co/gx4O0QEjeg pic.twitter.com/eJQuTd448O
— Reuters (@Reuters) August 7, 2021
Imposing vaccine rules: Cruise lines have begun to impose more rules as a precaution against #DeltaVariant. Most cruise lines are operating w/ at least 95% of passengers and crew vaccinated https://t.co/eR5ZbWmU3O
— delthia ricks ? (@DelthiaRicks) August 6, 2021
======
People who have recovered from COVID-19 are urged to get vaccinated. A new study shows survivors who ignored that advice had twice the risk of getting reinfected. https://t.co/PFKO5xARGf
— AP Health & Science (@APHealthScience) August 6, 2021
New @CDC anal of >7200 ppl >age 64 who got infected w/#SARSCoV2 shows HUGE differences in #COVID19 hospitalization rates based on vaccination rates. Fully vaxed you get 96% hosp-prevention from @pfizer -BioNTech, 96% from @moderna_tx & 84% frm @JanssenUS.https://t.co/c6Y1IyJocS pic.twitter.com/1xjvHNABwy
— Laurie Garrett (@Laurie_Garrett) August 6, 2021
Every expert I speak to thinks Novavax's vaccine will be a terrific addition to the #Covid arsenal — if they can get it to market. Novavax still hasn't filed for an EUA in the US & they only expect to be able to make 100M doses/month by the end of Q3. https://t.co/Zg51CDuoMJ
— Helen Branswell (@HelenBranswell) August 6, 2021
The @WHO-led Solidarity trial, looking for treatments for #Covid19, is about to resume with 3 new targets to test, @kakape reports. https://t.co/Cw0KKcSty4
— Helen Branswell (@HelenBranswell) August 6, 2021
Can a tuberculosis vaccine approved in 1921 protect people 65 & older from Covid? Scientists suspect the Bacillus Calmette-Guérin—BCG—vax, named after its developers, might spare older adults from Covid's ravages. BCG tamps down pro-inflammatory responses https://t.co/rsU4Ftz1RT pic.twitter.com/QYffFV8pIQ
— delthia ricks ? (@DelthiaRicks) August 5, 2021
The rise of the delta variant reinforces warnings by global experts that, in a connected world, leaving millions unvaccinated raises the likelihood that more transmissible — and even more lethal — variants will spread https://t.co/7abWp7KwuV
— Harvard Medical School (@harvardmed) August 6, 2021
======
I got a call last night asking to transfer a patient from a small town in Arkansas to our hospital…in Indianapolis. 600+ miles away. Because every other hospital they tried to call any closer was on diversion status.
Be patient with us America. We are tired. We are crowded.
— Jennifer Hartwell, MD FACS (@traumamom4) August 6, 2021
And preventable deaths, too pic.twitter.com/XLklY3fSqa
— Eric Topol (@EricTopol) August 5, 2021
Florida’s Board of Education has approved an emergency rule to allow private school vouchers to parents who say their school district’s mask-wearing mandates amount to child harassment. Florida leads the nation in COVID-19 related hospitalizations. https://t.co/SuFKKslc1J
— The Associated Press (@AP) August 6, 2021
CNN fires unvaccinated employees for going to office https://t.co/uj1M5sr40P
— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) August 6, 2021
When you have this much clout, might as well use it for good:
Jennifer Aniston explains cutting off unvaccinated friends https://t.co/lJqvq0MhXr
— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) August 6, 2021
… “I’ve just lost a few people in my weekly routine who have refused or did not disclose [whether or not they had been vaccinated], and it was unfortunate. I feel it’s your moral and professional obligation to inform, since we’re not all podded up and being tested every single day.”
She added: “It’s tricky because everyone is entitled to their own opinion – but a lot of opinions don’t feel based in anything except fear or propaganda.”
Aniston is one of the most famous actresses in the world, thanks in large part to her portrayal of Rachel on the US sitcom Friends…
Aniston broke an Instagram record (which has since been beaten) when she joined the social media platform in 2019, and now has 37 million followers.
NeenerNeener
Monroe County, NY:
111 new cases on 8/6, 3.1% test positivity.
Ugh.
YY_Sima Qian
On 8/6 China reported 75 new domestic confirmed cases, 20 new domestic asymptomatic cases & 1 domestic suspect case.
Yunnan Province did not report any new domestic positive cases. 3 domestic confirmed case recovered. There currently are 54 domestic confirmed & 1 domestic asymptomatic cases there. 1 community at Ruili remains at High Risk. 3 site at Ruili & 1 village at Longchuan County remain at Medium Risk.
Jiangsu Province reported 53 new domestic confirmed cases. 5 domestic confirmed cases recovered. There are currently 498 domestic confirmed & 1 domestic asymptomatic cases in the province.
Anhui Province did not reported at new domestic positive cases. There currently are 2 domestic asymptomatic cases in the province, both traced to the outbreak in Nanjing.
Liaoning Province did not reported at new domestic positive cases. There currently are 5 domestic confirmed & 3 domestic asymptomatic cases in the province, all traced to the outbreak in Nanjing.
Guangdong Province did not reported at new domestic positive cases. There currently are 1 domestic confirmed & 1 domestic asymptomatic cases in the province, both traced to the outbreak in Nanjing.
Hunan Province reported 9 new domestic confirmed (3 previously asymptomatic) & 1 new domestic asymptomatic cases. There are currently are 67 domestic confirmed & 22 domestic asymptomatic cases in the province.
Sichuan Province did not reported at new domestic positive cases. There currently are 8 domestic confirmed & 2 domestic asymptomatic cases in the province, all traced to the outbreaks in Nanjing & Zhangjiajie.
Henan Province reported 4 new domestic confirmed & 4 new domestic asymptomatic cases. There are currently 25 domestic confirmed & 106 domestic asymptomatic cases in the province.
Hubei Province reported 9 new domestic confirmed & 15 new domestic asymptomatic cases. There currently are 31 domestic confirmed & 38 domestic asymptomatic cases in the province.
At Chongqing Municipality there are currently 2 domestic confirmed & 1 domestic asymptomatic cases, 2 had traveled to Xi’an in Shaanxi Province & 1 connected to the construction site cluster at Wuhan.
At Beijing Municipality there currently are 8 domestic confirmed & 1 domestic asymptomatic cases in the city, all connected to the outbreak at Zhangjiajie in late Jul. 2 residential compounds remain at Medium Risk.
Yantai in Shandong Province reported 1 new domestic suspect case. There currently are 11 domestic confirmed, 3 domestic asymptomatic & 1 domestic suspect cases in the city, all likely traced to the outbreak in Nanjing. 3 sites remain at Medium Risk.
At Yinchuan in Ningxia “Autonomous” Region there currently is 1 domestic confirmed case in the city, a person who had traveled from Changde in Hunan Province on 7/28, & a traced close contact w/ the boat cruise super-spreading event there.
At Hulun Buir in Inner Mongolia “Autonomous” Region there currently is 1 new domestic confirmed case (at Hailar), who had stayed at the same floor in same hotel at the same time as the confirmed case reported by Yinchuan.
At Haikou in Hainan Province there currently are 2 domestic confirmed cases in the city, a person who had crossed paths w/ the party from Huai’an in Jiangsu Province on company outing at Jingzhou high speed rail station & a worker at the airport. The two are unlikely to be connected. 1 residential compound remains at Medium Risk.
At Xiamen in Fujian Province there currently are 4 domestic confirmed & 1 domestic asymptomatic cases in the city, all of whom are close contacts of the imported confirmed case (cargo flight crew) reported on 7/30. 2 residential compounds remain at Medium Risk.
At Shanghai Municipality there currently is 1 domestic asymptomatic case, an airport ground staff & unlikely to be connected to other domestic outbreaks. 1 residential compound remains at Medium Risk.
Imported Cases
On 8/6, China reported 32 new imported confirmed cases, 12 imported asymptomatic cases:
Overall in China, 33 confirmed cases recovered, 12 asymptomatic cases were released from isolation & 6 were reclassified as confirmed cases, and 1,056 individuals were released from quarantine. Currently, there are 1,444 active confirmed cases in the country (725 imported), 39 in serious condition (13 imported), 571 asymptomatic cases (388 imported), 2 suspect case (both imported). 44,273 traced contacts are currently under centralized quarantine.
As of 8/6, 1,757.780M vaccine doses have been injected in Mainland China, an increase of 15.968M doses in the past 24 hrs.
On 8/7, Hong Kong reported 7 new positive cases, all imported (from Spain, Austria, France, Tanzania & the US).
OzarkHillbilly
Putting the DUH! in Flori.
OzarkHillbilly
New England sticks out like a healthy thumb on an otherwise mangled hand in that map.
Cermet
Considering the stupidity level – i.e. being a republican – getting 50% of all US people fully vaccinated is an impressive achievement. Relative to 12 and up, we are just under 60% fully vaccinated. While this woun’t stop the pandemic, it certainly is a vast improvement compared to where I thought we’d be. Trying to make lemonade from lemons but thanks (really ?) to Delta we are progressing. Now we MUST help all of the America’s (esp. Mexico and Central America) as our next priority – then the rest of the world.
Baud
I didn’t realize Jennifer Anniston was that popular.
Matt McIrvin
Even saying the vaccines can no longer prevent transmission is a misstatement–they actually still do a lot to prevent transmission, since they still cut down infection by something like a factor of 8. They’re just not so foolproof in that regard that vaccinated people should feel free to go around without masks.
YY_Sima Qian
Sigh, this 4th wave in the States is truly tragic. It does not seem the US will be able to quite follow the UK’s trajectory, because the UK’s vaccination has been much more evenly distributed.
Then again, every wave since the 1st has been tragic.
My parents in Upstate NY have been largely isolating themselves for the past year & half, & it is extremely difficult for them to come back to China. I am not sure when they will be able to see their granddaughter in person again.
They told me that masking in the grocery stores have now dropped to very low levels, with none of the employees at the local Walmart masked up, & few other customers. Well, culturally & politically, the area in between Syracuse & Rochester might as well be Alabama. I told them to wear the KN95 masks I shipped them when they go shopping, even though both are fully vaccinated. When everyone is wearing masks, a surgical mask might suffice in large spaces even in face of Delta. However, if few people are masking (& many of them may not be fully vaccinated), a surgical mask is no longer adequate.
lowtechcyclist
65,000 doses of vaccine in Alabama have expired
https://twitter.com/kaitlancollins/status/1423678023719555073
This just plain shouldn’t be happening. They should have been put on a refrigerator truck to Mexico last week.
At an event in Alabama, MTG mentioned that Alabama was one of the least-vaccinated states in the U.S.A. And the crowd cheered.
https://twitter.com/Mediaite/status/1423706917780836356
God, what dumbasses.
Matt McIrvin
@OzarkHillbilly: New England is going to be red on that map within a couple of weeks. We’ve been hit less hard this time because we’ve got a large region where vaccination rates are relatively high, but cases are still going up and most people are still acting like the pandemic is over. And even vaccination rates aren’t higher here than, say, in South Florida–it’s just that our zone of separation from low-vax covidiot regions is deeper, like wetlands buffering a city from hurricane flooding.
Spanky
Who’s this Gavin Yamey dude, with his “locking and blocking” bullshit?
I thought that there wasn’t sufficient infrastructure to keep the vaccines cold enough in many parts of the world. And where is the evidence of blocking?
OzarkHillbilly
Went to WallyWorld the other day. Damned near everybody in the store was wearing a mask. Maybe you can fix stupid.
Or at least bury it.
Baud
With the Olympics almost over, I haven’t seen much reporting on the success of covid protocols. I assume no news is good news.
Platonicspoof
Yesterday catclub and others in John’s herd immunity thread were wondering about the cost of vaccines/vaccination. In my case I used my Medicare card and received both Pfizer shots at the Oregon Convention Center.
For examples like mine, CMS says (Centers = say) Medicare payment rates for administering COVID-19 vaccines after March 14th are about $40 per dose. The Medicare summary I received later says the provider charged $62.57 per dose, Medicare paid $41.71 and of course I wasn’t billed anything.
Thanks again to Anne Laurie, the other front pagers and all the commenters for keeping a focus on the pandemic.
Baud
@OzarkHillbilly:
People who don’t believe reality learn the hard way that reality believes in them.
YY_Sima Qian
@Matt McIrvin:
I think those are mRNA numbers, probably significantly lower for the J&J vaccine.
Far too much of the reporting, even communication from the parts of the Biden Administration, have been binary throughout this pandemic. Vaccines are either “highly effective” (when referring to mRNA vaccines) or “of doubtful effectiveness” (when referring to Chinese vaccines). Vaccines are either still effective against Delta, or ineffective against Delta. Masks are either “necessary” or “unnecessary”. Young people are either “relatively safe” from COVID or still at “substantial risk”. It’s like they are trying to dumb things down to talk to children. But then, an awful lot of people act like petulant children, with corresponding reasoning abilities.
I think some of the Biden Administration’s communications were born of an understandable desire to contrast w/ the previous regime, give hope to a weary population & coax the reluctant to get shots (vaccinated don’t need to wear masks, vaccinated are safe, celebrate on Independence Day, etc.), but I felt they were ill-advised. They should have accounted for the potential complications brought by Delta, & been more conservative in their communication & guidance.
OzarkHillbilly
The closing paragraph of this article:
I wonder when a majority of Texans will figure out the contempt their GOP betters hold them in.
Robert Sneddon
@OzarkHillbilly: There is no hard border between the Southern states and the north-east, nothing to stop infected people travelling and spreading this virus in places where it is temporarily in abeyance because there’s a baby shower four states over or Granny wants to see her kids or it’s vacation time or the Offspring is going off to college or…
For the past twelve months or so I’ve watched one nation after another being held up by posters on this blog as an exemplar of “dealing with COVID-19” and I’ve shaken my head in despair at the attitudes being expressed. This virus will get everywhere eventually absent a biolab-quality quarantine and it will eventually infect everyone on the entire planet. Vaccination reduces the chance of any individual being infectious, much more than hand-washing and what passes for mask-wearing in the general public but even full vaccination of a single individual using effective vaccines isn’t a 100% guarantee for them of being ‘safe’. As long as there are events like the Olympics and Euro2020 football and Thanksgiving and the Sturgis rally and many other virus-Mixmaster events around the world this virus will find a willing set of ACE2 receptors somewhere and T-cells be damned.
Matt McIrvin
@YY_Sima Qian: With the J&J it’s probably more like a factor of 3 or 4 against infection. Which is relevant to my interests since my wife got the J&J. But she’s being very careful.
mrmoshpotato
@OzarkHillbilly:
Never. Too many would rather own the libs by dying.
Amir Khalid
My laptop has no access to the internet at present and I can’t post a long update from my phone. Please bear with me until I can again. It may be another day or two.
New Deal democrat
As expected, Floriduh’s Friday data dump was a doozy. New cases set a record. On average, nearly 1 in 1000 Floridians had a new *confirmed* case of COVID every day last week. Hospitalizations at a new record high. Deaths already roughly 1/2 of prior peaks. Deaths will almost certainly make a new all time high within the next month.
Floriduh’s boost to the death total pushed the nationwide average to 500/day, from 250 only 15 days ago. Deaths are very much on track to meet my forecast of 1000/day by the end of this month. And since cases have doubled in the past two weeks, deaths are probably going to increase to 1500/day by mid-September.
Silver linings: the remaining hesitant seniors have been running to get their shots. Over 80% fully vaccinated (note: this *must* include millions of Trumpie Fox News viewers). To a lesser extent, so have residents of the hardest hit States.
And with testing having increased 50% in the past 2 weeks, with positivity rates running as high as 25% in the South as a whole, Delta is burning through the dry tinder very quickly. It’s interesting that the High Plains haven’t been hit hard at all by Delta, fueling my theory that they already stumbled into herd immunity with their massive outbreak last autumn.
When does Delta peak? That is the question we need answered now. My best guess: about Labor Day.
West of the Rockies
Why is it so bloody difficult for some people to admit they’re wrong? “Oh, damn, turns out Trump is a criminal clown, my bad… Shit, I guess Covid is real and the vaccine is great–guess I’ll get vaccinated.”
But, no, Republicans are so wildly arrogant and incandescently stupid that they’d rather die, rather kill their own than admit they’re wrong.
It’s stupefying.
mrmoshpotato
@Amir Khalid: Oh no. Hopefully it’s an easy fix.
Spanky
@New Deal democrat:
The answer is when Floriduh runs out of people.
OzarkHillbilly
@Matt McIrvin: @Robert Sneddon: To repeat myself: New England sticks out like a healthy thumb on an otherwise mangled hand in that map.
Seeing as neither one of you disagrees with my statement as it stands, I’m really not sure what point you are trying to make. That the future will no doubt be different than the present?
Well, shiver me timbers, I never would have guessed that!
germy
geg6
Well, my sister tested positive for a breakthrough case yesterday. She’d been feeling extremely fatigued and had what felt like severe allergy symptoms for a couple of days and decided to get tested just in case. She says she feels okay but this just pisses her off. She’s retired and has rarely left her house throughout this entire pandemic. She thinks it may be that her husband, who has had to travel for work, may have brought it home. He hasn’t had any symptoms, but he certainly could have been shedding virus. They are both fully vaxxed. Infuriating.
YY_Sima Qian
@New Deal democrat: I think Florida’s numbers are residents only, not including visitors.
Matt McIrvin
@New Deal democrat: Delta will peak in different places at different times. In the worst-hit counties of southern Missouri and northern Arkansas, cases already seem to be a little past peak. Massachusetts will probably have its peak in the fall just as the kids are coming back to school.
Ken
@OzarkHillbilly: Do I recall correctly, that private schools in Florida are still allowed to mandate masks? If so it seems particularly stupid of both the legislature and the parents to spend extra money for the transfer.
Peale
Looking at Rockland County numbers by zip. Monsey and Spring Valley are vaccinated at rates that make me envy Alabama. 20% and 24% respectively for first dose. Next month is going to be horrible.
Ken
@Baud: Anne Laurie’s COVID posts have usually included a “20 more COVID cases associated with the Olympics” report. That was about the magnitude of the daily number.
mrmoshpotato
@OzarkHillbilly:
Oh no! Gotta repair those masts!
Ken
When I read Jennifer Aniston’s “everyone is entitled to their opinion”, my thought was that it includes the virus, which outnumbers us a few billion to one. And its opinion is “hmmm, fresh meat.”
Ohio Mom
I haven’t ever held USA Today in any particular esteem but this weekend, it is The Newspaper of Record.
That map is gobsmacking. My god, we are a stupid people. We could have all been the upper Atlantic coast but no, we couldn’t.
Every morning, I check this post for world COVID news and the covidactnow.org site for my county/immmediate vicinity’s numbers (we are orange on the USA Today map). Somehow though the enormity of the hole our country has dug itself into had escaped me.
OzarkHillbilly
@Ken: I think the parents and legislators are assuming that the private schools w/o mask mandates will be able to take in all their children.
RSA
@OzarkHillbilly: Yup.
I think the map is a little deceptive, though; I looked up a population density map of the U.S., and it appears that most low-transmission counties are also low-density counties.
I think it would be interesting to see is a map that filtered out that factor or made it explicit.
Geminid
@OzarkHillbilly: Walmarts around central Virginia have also been pretty good the past ten months. Their guidance comes from the top, and I suspect that management and ownership understood that dead customers don’t buy stuff anymore.
Baud
@Ken:
It was never going to be 100%. The numbers seem relatively small.
mrmoshpotato
@Ken:
Fixed it for ya, Jen.
Ian R
@YY_Sima Qian: Who’d be crazy enough to willingly visit the Florida plague lands?
OzarkHillbilly
@RSA: True but there are some high density areas in all that tannish spread that aren’t red: Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Boston, even NY city seems to be OK other than Long Island. So it would seem their high vaccination rates have made a difference thus far in the Delta surge.
Gin & Tonic
@OzarkHillbilly: Like I said the other day, we have traveled all over, but I don’t see us leaving New England for quite a while.
New Deal democrat
@YY_Sima Qian: yes, Florida’s business model for COVID has been to let tourists get infected, and only show symptoms (and burden the health system) when they get home.
OzarkHillbilly
@Geminid: Walmart has kept their employees in line (more or less) but I was referring more to the customers. 2 weeks ago I could count the masked customers on 2 hands, Now it seems to be the unmasked customers I can count on 2 hands.
New Deal democrat
@Matt McIrvin: This is actually good news (that Delta shows signs of peaking in the earliest hit counties). It adds to the evidence that Delta burns through the dry tinder quickly.
Trevor Bedford estimated a month or so ago that Delta would infect about 35 million Americans, the vast majority of them unvaccinated. It makes a huge difference if he was correct, because that + vaccinations gets us very close to herd immunity.
Geminid
@OzarkHillbilly: Walmart customer masking in my area plummeted when Governor Northam dropped the state’s mask mandate. This week he reinstated the mandate for Virginia state entities, and “strongly advised” that private companies do likewise.
Robert Sneddon
@OzarkHillbilly: Over a year ago New York and surrounding states were the focus of the news reports about COVID-19, in that “healthy thumb” you describe in virtuous terms. Even now the COVID-19 totals for deaths in the north-east vastly exceed the un-virtuous southern states that are coloured bright red in the maps shown.
From the worldometers website, the three states with the highest death rates from COVID-19 adjusted for population are New Jersey, New York and Massachusetts, all with over 2600 deaths per million population. Florida is about 1850 deaths per million (which is about the UK national figure after we went in hard for virtuous lockdowns, mask mandates, vaccinations, border restrictions etc.)
By the time this epidemic stops being Big News a few years from now I expect most US states to have similar numbers in terms of deaths, hospitalisations and other measures of disease whether they have been virtuous or not. Epidemics are statistics and Thanksgiving is coming.
ObMovieReference: Masque of the Red Death (highly recommended BTW).
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
So yesterday, I walked in to my utterly unnecessary hearing (the one that was scheduled the day before over my vociferous concerns with a snide “if you don’t like it, you can take it up with the Chief Justice”) in an exurban courthouse. Parking lot was so full I had to park next door, and the deputies manning the magnetometer weren’t cleaning the personal item baskets (plus, there’s a “no bags” rule in place.
Keep in mind that I’m already coordinating with the Chief Justice’s scheduling clerk for a half hour of his time. I have several tapes of vaccinated lawyers getting recently infected, including a live mediation which resulted in a COVID exposure and the COVID death of the spouse of one of the litigants.
I sat inside that crowded, temporary facility for two hours. This morning, my nose just won’t stop running. I have concerns, as my wife is going to SC to visit her father next weekend.
I hate people.
a thousand flouncing lurkers was fidelio
Per the Tennessee Department of Health website, we have 3925 new cases, 29 new deaths, and 70 more hospitalizations since yesterday—or maybe on Friday since Thursday, as I don’t know if they update on weekends.
We have 1,458 available hospital beds, 178 available ICU beds (that’s 9% availability) and 482 available airborne infection isolation rooms.
Here in Davidson County, we have averaged 219.4 new cases a day over the past 14 days (7/23—8/05); for the 14 days prior (7/09—7/22), we had an average of 75.6 news cases a day. Our positivity rate was 13.4%. Hamilton County (Chattanooga) is at 19.6% and Shelby County (Memphis) is at 17.8%.
Our part of the right-wing radio noise machine, Phil Valentine, admitted, prior to his intubation, that he wished he’d been vaccinated and that his earlier remarks weren’t so much anti-vaccination as they were a call for more information. This is becoming a part of the public La Rona ritual for conservatives, at least here in the South, where it fits in with other traditions like the altar call and the Sinner’s Prayer.
45.4% of the population has had at least one dose of a vaccine (any flavor) and 39.6% are fully vaccinated.
We are so fucked.
But this is happening today! I hope they don’t wreck the bridge—we need it intact.
New Deal democrat
A few of you may know that my main gig is watching and forecasting the economy.
In that regard, it’s interesting that the Delta wave has had almost no effect so far at all. Maybe restaurant reservations a little bit over the last 5 days, but that’s it. So far, there’s simply no significant evidence of people altering their behavior because of Delta (except anecdotally maybe an increase in mask-wearing, which I’ve noticed in my neck of the woods also).
dr. bloor
@OzarkHillbilly: Simply pointing out the fact that highly vaccinated regions are enjoying slower growth and reduced hospitalizations is–what’s the word?–apostasy for some posters.
a thousand flouncing lurkers was fidelio
@Amir Khalid: Stay safe. We need you more than we need that dataset.
John S.
@Ken: It’s the same scam they have been running in Florida for years. The Republican occupant in the FL Governor mansion is always cozy with the monied education folks. So they are always finding ways to steer students into private schools or charter schools. It’s pure grift.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@New Deal democrat:
I popped in to the grocery last night – I was the only man in a mask, but about half of the women were masked. People had really been cleaning out the paper products and freezable items like sausage. I think shortages are coming back.
Peale
@OzarkHillbilly: NYC is about to experience the joys of having large pockets of the proudly unvaxxed. The modelers know it’s coming. My partners hospital is cancelling elective surgeries again after next week. Brooklyn, Staten Island and the Bronx have not been holding up their part of the bargain.
Chief Oshkosh
WRT to that USA Today headline: Who is “we”? The ONLY people who have failed the nation and the world are the anti-vaxxers. So, no, “we” haven’t failed one another. The smart people are getting pissed and will start looking for ways to mitigate the damage…And not all of us are bleeding hearts when it comes to how it gets done.
Robert Sneddon
@dr. bloor: Florida has a very high vaccination rate for residents, especially the older retirees in gated residential areas who are, IIRC, over 90% fully vaccinated. Those folks are not what is driving the current wave of new cases and hospitalisations, except at a remove — lots of holidaymakers are travelling to Florida carrying incipient infections with them and raising the local levels of viral load in shops, airports, cruise ships and other places. The extra viral load pushes up the chances of significant infection for even vaccinated locals, statistically speaking. Old folks plus infection means a higher chance of hopitalisation even with vaccination.
Epidemics are statistics.
a thousand flouncing lurkers was fidelio
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: I’m so sorry. It suppose it would be wrong to hope for the judge to catch a case.
dr. bloor
@Robert Sneddon:
The R0 values in the NE states have been just as high as elsewhere across the country for weeks now, but the case rates and particularly the hospitalization rates are substantially lower. That even counts for NE’s tourist-fueled hot spots right now, like Barnstable and Newport Counties.
The virus is everywhere. The vaccinations are working. Very effectively. You know, statistics.
BTW, your pointing out that the mortality rates in NE are really high as some sort of predictive statistic in the current situation is cherry-picking, since the vast majority of those deaths came in the first wave.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@a thousand flouncing lurkers was fidelio:
She sits at her bench and doesn’t wear a mask.
Robert Sneddon
@dr. bloor: The vaccinations are indeed working very effectively. Apart from quarantine-style isolation they’re the only real prophylactic measure humanity can apply against this respiratory virus (masks help but the ways the general public wear masks are borderline useful at best).
Infected vaccinated people are passing this disease on to uninfected vaccinated people, at a significantly lesser rate than they would pass it to someone who is unvaccinated but it’s still being transmitted because there are so many people out there, travelling long distances to attend baby showers and visit Grandpa in the Villages in Florida and Sturgis and July 4th and Thanksgiving. The best we can hope for with vaccinations is lower numbers of serious cases and deaths, not an extinction of this disease because it’s statistical.
The virtuous north-east, the “healthy thumb” as one poster upthread described it is open for business, air travel numbers are up and still rising, the virus is still on the move. Believing a given location is immune from this disease because it is better in terms of vaccination numbers while another location is worse because its inhabitants aren’t being virtuous is wishful thinking at best and a disaster in the making down the line.
dr. bloor
@Robert Sneddon:
The virus is already here, in spades. So what’s the explanation for NE being the last, and over the longer term almost certainly least hardest hit in this wave (in terms of case rates and hospitalizations)? Or are you really predicting that MA is going to look like FL by the middle of September?
Robert Sneddon
Scotland — 1,386 new cases of COVID-19 reported with nine new reported deaths of someone who had tested positive. Test positivity rate is 6.3%. Hospitalisations and ICU bed occupancy numbers again fell noticeably. Scaling up to compare against the US on a per-capita basis, this would represent about 70,000 new cases a day and 550 deaths (Scotland has a population of about 5.5 million people).
Over 21,000 vaccinations were administered in Scotland yesterday (Friday) with about 10% of those vaccinations being first doses. 74.2% of the adult population are now fully vaccinated with another 15.8% having received their initial dose of vaccine. Scotland has finally reached the goal of 90% first vaccination of adults aged over 18 but the reduced rate of first vaccinations over the past month or so indicates the vaccination hesitancy (for whatever reason) limit may be being reached.
topclimber
The CNN report quotes CDC chief as saying tens of thousands of vaccinated folks may get breakthrough cases, compared to 160M vaccinated. Calling this a “majority” being not at risk, rather than a “huge” majority is piss poor journalism.
Chief Oshkosh
@New Deal democrat: Not so sure about that. Agreed that surviving Covid may lead one to be somewhat more immune than not, but unvaccinated have gotten very sick, and at least some died, from getting Covid twice.
Chief Oshkosh
@a thousand flouncing lurkers was fidelio: Probably wouldn’t change much. Heck I know of a small-ish circuit where two middle-aged judges DIED of Covid (and one was under 50 y.o.). Chief Justice’s opinion was basically “fuck it, we got a backlog and we need to process the meatbags.”
Robert Sneddon
It could well do. You are focussing on this wave in much the same way a lot of conservatives focussed on the first wave last year, when it was the ‘Blue’ states who were suffering high rates of infection and mortality because they lacked the All-American virtues of the ‘Red’ states which meant this highly infectious disease could never affect Them. Remember that? Of course SARS-CoV-2 is a virus, it doesn’t discriminate between virtuous and unvirtuous hosts, it just digs in to the host’s ACE2 receptors shouting “Itadakimasu!” while the host’s immune system struggles to keep up.
Bad news, you may want to sit down for this but the current wave isn’t the last wave, it’s just the current wave and there will be another. The Imperial College London epidemiologists are already modelling what the next wave will be like in the UK, expecting it to start in late November or early December. It’s not going to be nice, a lot of people, vaccinated and unvaccinated are going to get sick with an added Influenza From Hell season on top. What they’re hoping is that the health services won’t collapse under the increased load. If they manage that everything else is gravy as far as they are concerned. This is in a country where the vaccination rates match or exceed the “healthy thumb” of the US north-east.
Matt McIrvin
@dr. bloor:
We’ve got a slightly deeper buffer of high-vaccination land separating us from the worst disaster zones. That slows it down.
Yes, it will–if measured in case rates. Severe disease and death will be lower because we’ve got more vaccination.
But not that much more. Florida isn’t actually a low-vaccination state! It’s a medium-vaccination state. Miami-Dade has a higher vax rate than Essex County, Massachusetts, where I live. COVID is raging in Miami-Dade right now.
Robert Sneddon
@Chief Oshkosh: Anecdotally, I’ve seen one report of someone who caught COVID-19 over a year ago, recovered, got vaccinated, (seemingly) caught the disease again between doses, recovered again and now after being fully vaccinated they have become symptomatic yet again. Biologically speaking I don’t see this as being impossible given the vagaries of immune systems and people generally. It just takes time for these situations to occur often enough to be noticeable and we’re only at the start of this disease’s progression through humanity, not anywhere near its ending.
Robert Sneddon
@Matt McIrvin:
US inter-state air travel is currently at its highest levels for months. Unlike international travel to and from most countries and the US there’s no requirements for vaccinations, COVID-19 testing, quarantine on arrival etc. Anyone can book a ticket and fly from, say, Miami-Dade to Boston, hopping over that buffer. The aircrew might insist you wear a mask for the flight.
Of course anyone driving I-95 from Miami to Boston stopping in at all the most scenic plague spots along the way can avoid that onerous mask mandate.
dr. bloor
@Robert Sneddon:
@Robert Sneddon:
There will be others for the next several years, I would imagine (You might want to sit down for this, but I know how to read, too); the issue is where they fall on the spectrum of “Nuisance” to “Extinction Event.”
We’re mostly talking past one another at this point, so I will leave it at this: If MA looks like FL on 10/1 in terms of hospitalization and mortality rates, I will donate $100 to the charity of your choice (Matt McIrvin can get in on this action as well). If not, get your checkbooks out and send the same to The Jimmy Fund.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Chief Oshkosh:
Thankfully, our CJ isn’t so thoughtless, but he’s getting a fuckton of pushback from scores of tinpot robed lawyers who just happened to win an election or two.
The job is about serving the public, not vice versa.
WaterGirl
@New Deal democrat: Not so good news if Delta peaking makes room for Lamba.
Robert Sneddon
More Scotland news — 16 and 17 year olds will be able to get vaccinated starting today at some drop-in vaccination centres with the rest of the centres being made available by Tuesday as staff are trained up and extra supplies of the Pfizer vaccine as used in younger people are allocated to them. The expectation is that the estimated 109,000 Scots in this age group will be offered a first vaccination by the end of September, just after school has started.
Matt McIrvin
@dr. bloor:
I wouldn’t take that bet because I’m expecting a big spike in cases, but a smaller one in hospitalizations and deaths. Our vax coverage of senior citizens IS higher. Massachusetts is going to look more like the UK than like Florida.
Where I differ from Robert Sneddon is that I actually don’t think breakthrough infections in an endemic-COVID world are going to be anything like the menace that COVID version 1 was. They’ll be more like seasonal flu waves–ironically, a lot like what the MAGA chuds were insisting COVID was all along, only vaccination combined with prior infection will be what made the difference.
Back before there was a vaccine, I noticed that the more an expert knew about coronaviruses and immunology, the more optimistic they seemed to be about vaccines–the scary “maybe there won’t be a vaccine” think-pieces were coming from people with less information. I don’t know a coronavirus from a hole in the ground but I was paying attention to the people who did.
Today, the pattern is that the more an expert knows about coronaviruses and immunology, the less likely they are to be crowing about a doomsday variant that cuts through vaccine-induced immunity like a hot knife through butter. A lot of them are even saying the supposed need for booster shots is overblown.
Cermet
@Robert Sneddon: You forget the #1 reason for what the differences are – back then there were no good treatments; that has changed a great deal. Then #2, we have a vaccine saving huge numbers of people. So apple, look at orange.
Gvg
@Robert Sneddon: I would guess that person has an immunity problem. If I were their doctor I would be doing tests and advocating for a third dose. That person should probably try to stay isolated. Not their fault, just bad luck.
Starfish
@lowtechcyclist: There are all sorts of places in distribution where vaccines get lost.
I think there is some indicator on the shipments that tell you if they have fallen out of the temperature range that they should be kept at, and if the indicator shows that the doses were out of that range, they all get trashed.
Mississippi told the federal government to keep its excess doses because it just could not distribute, so there is less waste there.
Sloane Ranger
Friday in the UK we had 31,808 new cases. This is the 3rd day in a row with a rise in new cases. The previous fall, however, means that the rolling 7-day average is still showing a decrease of 6.2%. New cases by nation,
England – 28,321 (up 1809)
Northern Ireland – 1434 (down 207)
Scotland – 1250 (down 131) but see Robert Sneddon above for more recent data.
Wales – 803 (up 122).
Deaths – There were 92 deaths within 28 days of a positive test yesterday. This is an increase of 18.3% in the rolling 7-day average. 81 deaths were in England, 4 in Northern Ireland, 7 in Scotland and 0 in Wales.
Testing – On Thursday, 5 August, 825,501 tests were conducted. This is a reduction of 9.2% in the rolling 7-day average. The PCR testing capacity reported by labs on that date was 704,773.
Hospitalisations – On Thursday, 5 August, 5631 people were in hospital and 871 were on ventilators. The rolling 7-day average for hospital admissions was down 13.4% as of 2 August.
Vaccinations – As of Thursday, 5 August, 46,961,830 people had received 1 shot of a vaccine and 39,047,529 had had both. This means that, as of this date, 88.8% of all adults had had 1 shot and 73.8% were fully vaccinated. Vaccinations of 16 and 17 year olds has now started. They do not require parental consent to get jabbed. I don’t know if their figures will show up separately in the stats or be rolled up in vaccinations generally. It will be interesting to find out.
Sloane Ranger
@Amir Khalid: Sorry to hear that. Nothing serious or expensive I hope?
Fake Irishman
@Cermet:
I see this “we must help others!” Comment often. Thing is, we are. A lot. Follow Wendy Sherman’s Twitter feed as suggested by Cheryl Rofer a few weeks ago. Here’s a partial set of countries we’ve given doses to in the New World: Mexico, Guatemala, Haiti, El salvador, Honduras, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Brazil, Bolivia, Paraguay and Panama. That’s most countries in the Western Hemisphere we have good relations with and even some we don’t. nor are the donations merely symbolic (eg 10,000 or so) but generally a million or more per donation — that’s enough to cover a lot of folks in a country with less than 10 million.
we’ve also made large donations to Afghanistan, Pakistan, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Laos Iraq, Nepal, Bhutan, The Gambia, Djibouti, Nigeria, South Africa, Madagascar, Sudan, Mauritiania South Korea Taiwan and others. It’s a mix of close allies, and income levels. Check Sherman’s feed for more. Could we do more? Sure. But there is a pretty competent and generous plan that’s being executed even as lots of folks scream loudly about the us not doing enough.
New Deal democrat
@WaterGirl: Delta appears to be much more infectious than Lambda, which is why after 1 year the latter is still almost entirely confined to parts of Latin America, while the former has circled the globe in 6 months. Just speculation, but if infection by Delta confers resistance to Lambda, even temporarily, ironically it may act like a backfire firebreak.
Robert Sneddon
We, meaning the world, have a pretty good knowledge of coronaviruses and their behaviour because ‘We’ were doing Science! on them for decades even before this mess kicked off. The A-list blockbuster movie storyline of the Mutant Virus From Hell which results in a zombie apocalypse and lots of Stuff Blowey Uppy is a work of fiction. If SARS-CoV-2 could mutate that way it wouldn’t be a coronavirus any more.
One guesstimate I read by an epidemiologist said that a significant variant of this coronavirus family is occurring about, IIRC, once in 50 million infections. There are lots more mutations than that of course but 99.999%-plus of those mutations are non-viable and don’t replicate. The ones that do replicate successfully have to keep their hosts alive to spread widely whereas severely damaging their hosts or killing them quickly is not a good evolutionary move, generally speaking.
The Science! on booster shots is not done yet but it is being worked on with various trials being carried out around the world. The British trial involving people vaccinated in January and February this year who have been given booster shots on a double-blind protocol should be announcing results some time in September. What’s not out there yet is any real evidence that boosters will actually do good for everyone, at least not this early in the initial vaccination process. Measurements of seropositivity in blood samples taken from long-term (six months plus) vaccinated folks indicate little reduction of qualified immunity over that timespan but this isn’t the same as a proper trial since seropositivity isn’t a precise measurement of proof against infection.
TL:DR; booster shots may be a good idea, the numbers aren’t in yet.
Scout211
We had to use KN95 masks this morning on our walk. The NorCal air is in the unhealthy to very unhealthy range due to the smoke drifting south from the Dixie Fire and the River Fire. We did not see the sun yesterday for the entire day. I purchased KN95 and N95 masks for the fire season as well as a HEPA air purifier with an additional filter for toxins before the current wave of the Delta variant. We are all stocked up now for the smoke and for the virus. Sigh. Strange times we are living in . . .
Matt
“We” have been failing? No, SOME PEOPLE have been failing and now “we” all have to suffer the consequences. It’s time to start explicitly calling out the people who are the problem here.
Like this rocket scientist, who decided he’d “show everyone it wasn’t that bad”:
https://twitter.com/RonFilipkowski/status/1423794706388029440
He’s dead now, because he decided that he believed randos on Facebook over medical science. I hope it hurt a whole lot, and may he rot in piss.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Worth point out I live in Alameda County CA, 72% of the population is vaccinated, the infection rate is pretty much back to last winter, but something like 75% of the infections are among the vaccinated. In other words it’s that 28% unvaccinated that’s driving this. So this will be over in Alameda when 70% of our local idiots get COVID hard enough to get the anti bodies, or they die.
https://covid-19.acgov.org/
Hmm I wonder if a mass pool party with mandatory tongue kissing and shared drinking cups to celebrate Freedom, with anyone with a vaccinate card is denied entry, might be viable. That way these idiots all get ill at once and it’s over in three weeks, Call it “Playing with Matches Festival”.
Matt McIrvin
Speaking of experts, I’m also seeing them slamming the Biden administration hard for Jen Psaki’s statement that we’re not going to lock down the economy or the schools again–saying that it’s too categorical a statement, that future actions should be evidence-based.
https://twitter.com/EpiEllie/status/142399875059126272
Speaking personally, I think general shutdowns are politically impossible but I’m uncomfortable with saying such things about the schools until the under-12s can be vaccinated and widespread mandates for it are in place.
WaterGirl
@New Deal democrat: That’s a big IF, though, pure speculation.
I am suggesting that if Delta burns itself out, then it will no longer be backstopping Lamda, no longer keeping Lambda from gaining more ground in circulation.
That is speculation also
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Yes, I got the impression that these thing always end with the virus mutating in milder and milder strains but more infectious. The whole Skippy the Super Virus in 1918 was because of the backward logic of war were the mild cases were isolated in the Trenches and the more lethal strains were sent to the hospital to infect more people.
Matt McIrvin
@WaterGirl: The pattern I see with the prevalence of different COVID variants is that antibody evasion is a distant second to raw reproduction rate. Delta is taking over the world not by subtlety but by brute force–it just reproduces really fast. It’s dominated over variants that are better at evading antibody resistance more than once.
But the other thing to understand is that the human immune system harnesses evolution too–in response not just to infection but to vaccination as well, and some of that actually produces cross-resistance to different coronavirus variants. Resistance to existing antibodies doesn’t necessarily translate to greater resistance to immunity in the real world.
Matt McIrvin
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: My impression is that the selection pressure for the virus to become less lethal is actually much less important than the ability of human immune systems to become more resistant.
The B cells that produce antibodies themselves undergo a kind of forced hyper-evolution inside the lymph nodes–it’s pretty amazing how it works. The immune system actually uses a bizarre genetic hack to speed up the rate of mutation–it replaces some of the cytosine bases in the DNA with uracil, the base normally only found in RNA. That reads as a copying error, and the cell’s error-correction mechanisms attempt to fix it and cause mutations. That ends up producing some B cells that make slightly different antibodies, and they somehow (I am not sure on details) get selected for their neutralizing ability against antigens. So the virus is evolving, but YOU are evolving too.
Robert Sneddon
@WaterGirl:
There’s nothing stopping someone getting infected and being infectious with the Delta variant AND the Lambda variant at the same time. The Delta variant is noticeably quicker to cause someone to become infectious than classic SARS-CoV-2 which gives it an evolutionary head start.
I’ve seen a report of someone who ended up in hospital having two different versions of the virus (not Delta and Lambda, this was some time ago) in the samples taken for testing. The person in question was reported as suffering their second COVID-19 infection, it’s possible the first virus was still present in their system from the initial exposure.
Robert Sneddon
@Matt McIrvin: One of the quotes I read early on in the epidemic, I wish I had kept a better note of it, from someone who did epidemiological work mostly in the Third World — “You get one hard lockdown. One.” The gist of her argument was that if things continue the sicknesses and deaths become the New Normal. Orders for a second hard lockdown will be ignored or flouted and the authorities don’t have nearly enough police and military to enforce it thoroughly, assuming they can get the enforcement arms to go along with the decision in the first place.
President Biden could stand up at the podium in late October and say, for example, “Thanksgiving is cancelled.” Anyone with any political (as in, of the polis, the people) acumen knows this would not work so he would never even consider doing it. Explaining why Thanksgiving needed to be cancelled wouldn’t help.
We had a case like this in Scotland last year — the original plan by the Scottish government was to have a lockdown in late December, just before Xmas and the big holiday over the New Year just as new case numbers and hospitalisations due to COVID-19 were starting to soar. Two weeks out they backtracked, preferring to reverse their decision rather than get bulldozed into the mud by millions of people disobeying this proposed lockdown.
“Politics is the art of the possible.”
Ken
No, that can’t be right. No less an expert than the governor of Florida himself has declared that the surge in cases is driven entirely by immigrants. Unless – are immigrants visiting Florida as tourists? Why hasn’t the governor acted to stop this?
In a more serious mode, I see that the last weekly batch from Florida is pretty much what everyone expected, and their case numbers are in the “we’re going to need a bigger Y-axis” part of the spike.
MontyTheClipArtMongoose
@OzarkHillbilly: virginia, a still-purple state, is less rona positive than oregon, the land of wokeness*.
*of course, oregon is also the capital district of antivaxxxia.
MontyTheClipArtMongoose
@Baud: there is no
spoonmekhi phiferMontyTheClipArtMongoose
@Chief Oshkosh: al neuharth was always a bothsiders.
MontyTheClipArtMongoose
@Robert Sneddon: clearly, this person is a performer in a final destination reboot.
Fair Economist
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: We have just this year got evidence on the mutation history during the Spanish Flu and it was evolving to better infect people rather than its original bird host. Even with the Spanish Flu or with Delta mortality rates are not high enough to create a substantial evolutionary push. The main force driving lower mortality in respiratory viruses is that they spread better from the upper respiratory tract, which happens to be less lethal as well. Delta, I think, is more lethal due to higher virulence and less lethal due to a shift to the upper respiratory tract, with the net being higher mortality. There is some evidence, tho, of substantially higher asymptomatic rates in India and the UK so perhaps Delta isn’t worse on average.
StringOnAStick
I now have good evidence that my RW Bircher 89 yo father is NOT vaccinated and has been lying, because FOX news of course. He’s a bitter, angry person and always has been but now that his health and lack of work means he watches FOX all day, he’s become impossible to talk to because every thing becomes an argument no matter how innocent the topic. My oldest sister the fellow RW evangelical cleans his house every week and he takes her to lunch; I’m glad I live far away because he has always hated that I’m a D and is swallowing the FOX poison 100% so I’m a target.
He’s planning yet another plane trip to see his even more horrible twin sister and so he and her son can try to get their older brother to agree to a nursing home due to his severe dementia. All my dad and his twin do is berate and bully the older brother, who can’t handle his affairs anymore and has “girlfriends” who are draining him dry financially. My dad rants constantly about what “a horrible person” his brother is; his brother is extremely liberal and a kind person, but liberal = horrible and worthy of nothing but abuse, so he and his sister abuse him mercilessly. Since my dad isn’t actually vaccinated, I suspect the delta is going to put an end to all this senior sibling drama fairly soon.
if the US becomes another Hungary it will be the original sin of FOX; that and all the families they have destroyed with their poison. Rot in hell Rupert.
Fair Economist
@Robert Sneddon: I understand the theory of “one hard lockdown” but places that have achieved Zero Covid via lock down get multiple bites at that apple, eg NZ, AUS, and both China’s. So it’s more “only one failed lockdown”.
Another Scott
Novavax news from ScienceMag:
Given that at least a few experts are now saying that COVID is going to transition to endemic at some point (i.e. we’ll not be rid of it for decades, if ever), continued development of the vaccine is important, even if it won’t help crush Delta any time soon.
Cheers,
Scott.
Splitting Image
@Ken:
If they were visiting as tourists, they would be storming the capital and overthrowing the government. Therefore, they must be immigrants.
Ksmiami
@StringOnAStick: they’ve chosen illness and death. Just get out of their way…
Kent
Strictly speaking Oregon is a bright red state that happens to contain one large blue city and several smaller blue college towns. If Portland were the size of Boise then Oregon would be about as red as Idaho.
The highest rates of Covid in Oregon are all from counties that went for Trump by margins in the 50% or more range.
Richard
@StringOnAStick:
I’m sorry to hear about your dad and family. My mom and dad were always republicans but fox news came along and poisoned them. I lost my parents.