Wow, it’s getting really scary in Texas - and everywhere else!

[REWahoo]

Meanwhile, the count (no, not THAT count!) continues:

Texas poised to hit 1 million Covid-19 cases, the most in the nation

Even when the results are potentially catastrophic, things are still bigger in Texas.

 

[HawkOwl]

Aren't cases in most every state surging? Is there any state where cases are NOT going up up up? I am afraid winter is going to be awful.

Depends on how you view it. In Florida new cases are up from a month ago. But they are half what they were in July. And deaths are down more than 40% in the last 14 days.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/florida-coronavirus-cases.html

 

[audreyh1]

Meanwhile, the count (no, not THAT count!) continues:

Texas poised to hit 1 million Covid-19 cases, the most in the nation

Even when the results are potentially catastrophic, things are still bigger in Texas.

Yeah, I expect it to happen today. Leading the pack in reported cases!

Also daily counts have returned to new highs, although the 7 day average has not yet caught up. So looking at the trend TX appears poised to exceeding the old summer peak.

 

[ABQ2015]

Aren't cases in most every state surging? Is there any state where cases are NOT going up up up? I am afraid winter is going to be awful.

Yes, but my point was that the entire state is about to run out of ICU beds even before Thanksgiving. And it is not cold yet. It is hard to find up to date statistics on available hospital beds by state so do not know how many other states are also in that position so early in the season.

 

[retire-early]

Is there a website that shows how many ICU beds are currently occupied for each state?

 

[Car-Guy]

Meanwhile, the count (no, not THAT count!) continues:

Texas poised to hit 1 million Covid-19 cases, the most in the nation

Even when the results are potentially catastrophic, things are still bigger in Texas.

I guess every website has there own sources for counting cases and deaths. The two I watch most often are significantly different. The Texas DHS website says we (Texas) have had 934,994 cases and 18,453 deaths as of toady. The World-O-Meter says Texas has had 997,916 cases and 19,030 deaths as of today... If World-O Meter is correct then we'll hit a million today... Maybe they are just out of sync but they are misleading. Maybe the answer is in the weeds. I'm sure some "smart person" here has a simple explanation . I'm not going to try to figure it out since it all comes out to "bad".

I hope the vote counters are better at getting the counts right.

 

[audreyh1]

The Texas state site doesn’t include some numbers AFAIK such as those from federal facilities. Most news sites use the numbers from Johns Hopkins University which are slightly behind Worldometers.

 

[Car-Guy]

The Texas state site doesn’t include some numbers AFAIK such as those from federal facilities. Most news sites use the numbers from Johns Hopkins University which are slightly behind Worldometers.

I knew there was a simple answer... Thanks


Now, when do we "really" hit a million NRR

 

[audreyh1]

Johns Hopkins is at 969,490 TX cases total through yesterday.

Worldometers is doing aggregation directly from county data and provides links to their sources. They continue to update during the day as counties report, and have a later cutoff to switch to the next day than the Texas state Covid tracking website.

The number of deaths per day numbers are very dependent on the cutoff per day. Worldometers takes them directly from county reporting. That’s why 7-day averages are important as it smoothes out the daily variations.

NY Times is another data aggregator. It usually trails Worldometers a bit, and doesn’t update daily until the next morning. It currently shows 996,301 cases through this afternoon.

 

[audreyh1]

I knew there was a simple answer... Thanks


Now, when do we "really" hit a million NRR

Well - I can't find that info anymore, so who knows!

 

[NW-Bound]

One million cases for the Texan population of 29 million. How much more is needed for "herd immunity"? I have read numbers like 60% to 70%.

Of course there are also untold cases that have not been tested (asymptomatic or with mild effects), but 1 in 29 is a lot lower than 60%.

 

[audreyh1]

I think estimates of actual exposures versus tested positive are something like 10 to 20x.

 

[cathy63]

One million cases for the Texan population of 29 million. How much more is needed for "herd immunity"? I have read numbers like 60% to 70%.

Of course there are also untold cases that have not been tested (asymptomatic or with mild effects), but 1 in 29 is a lot lower than 60%.

I was pondering this earlier today as I looked at the numbers for North Dakota. The charts (https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2020/national/coronavirus-us-cases-deaths/) show ND at 173 cases per 100K people per day. If I did the math right, that's 1.2% of the population getting sick per week and 6.8% have already had it. If the rate of spread does not increase further, it will be 48.5 weeks before ND reaches 65% infected, which is at the lower end of the herd immunity estimates.

That's a long time and a lot of deaths, and we still don't know how long immunity lasts.

This article by the public-health director for the city of Bismarck and Burleigh County, N.D. is worth reading: How North Dakota became a covid-19 nightmare

Deaths have more than doubled in the past month, and hospitals are at capacity. Rural hospitals are especially challenged. Typically, their critically ill patients are transferred to larger cities in North Dakota, which have better-resourced care facilities. But as even our larger hospitals are swamped, patients from rural areas have been sent out of state for care.

 

[audreyh1]

Practically speaking, exposure is probably at least 10x official case counts, so those trying to do projections should factor that in. Doesn’t help on the side of sustained immunity though - all we know so far is that it appears to be at least 6 months.

 

[Ronstar]

Practically speaking, exposure is probably at least 10x official case counts, so those trying to do projections should factor that in. Doesn’t help on the side of sustained immunity though - all we know so far is that it appears to be at least 6 months.

My niece has symptoms and is waiting for test results. She's been with other hockey moms - one of which tested positive last week. Same lady had Covid in March. So she's had Covid twice in 7-8 months.

 

[Aerides]

I think estimates of actual exposures versus tested positive are something like 10 to 20x.

I don't think that can be true though - while it's certainly higher than the case count of course. We have had 10M cases in the US. 10x would mean 1/3 of the country, 20 would mean nearing herd immunity.

If numbers were really in the 10-20x range, assuming some post-viral immunity, we'd be seeing a reduction in the R numbers and spread would start to slow down, when the opposite is happening.

 

[audreyh1]

A CDC report said 6x to 24x. Let me see if I can find it again.

This is from July: https://www.statnews.com/2020/07/21/cdc-study-actual-covid-19-cases/

I think at the time the CDC was using 10x as the number for exposed versus counted.

Maybe with lower positivity rates the ratio has dropped since because we’re doing a better job at catching cases, but it was pretty high in the early months. Still tons of asymptomatic people not getting tested, I would imagine.

 

[Aerides]

Thanks, that's interesting.

It's also from July though, when total cases were 3.8M, so maybe it was 10x back then? I still don't think that could be extrapolated to today's numbers because of the huge increase since then.

10x 3.8 - so, 38M, 10% of the country? Seems high-ish but I wouldn't quibble.
10x 10.1 - so that's 100M and 1/3 of the country - that's where I start to think those numbers wouldn't be valid today.

Because if it was still that high of a factor we'd be seeing a downslope with the virus not being able to infect as easily since it wouldn't be able to super-spread if 1/3-1/2 of us couldn't catch it anymore (again assuming antibody immunity).

 

[Montecfo]

My guess is some folks have inherent immunity. We do know from some of the testing/studies that some folks have pre-Covid19 immunity. The conjecture was that it was the result of earlier covid (but non-non-covid19) infections.

With the combination of that, untested exposures and folks knowingly getting Covid-19 and recovering, we may have a somewhat greater immune population that folks assume (just a guess).

 

[cathy63]

Thanks, that's interesting.

It's also from July though, when total cases were 3.8M, so maybe it was 10x back then? I still don't think that could be extrapolated to today's numbers because of the huge increase since then.

10x 3.8 - so, 38M, 10% of the country? Seems high-ish but I wouldn't quibble.
10x 10.1 - so that's 100M and 1/3 of the country - that's where I start to think those numbers wouldn't be valid today.

Because if it was still that high of a factor we'd be seeing a downslope with the virus not being able to infect as easily since it wouldn't be able to super-spread if 1/3-1/2 of us couldn't catch it anymore (again assuming antibody immunity).

Yes, that's my understanding too. When you have very few known cases and aren't testing as much, the actual exposure is going to be much higher than the known numbers. So 10x of .2% might be reasonable, but once you're up to 3% or 5% confirmed, you can't just keep multiplying by the same factor. I find it very hard to believe that 68% of the population of ND has had Covid. Even if herd immunity requires a higher number like 85%, then 68% exposure is enough to slow the spread significantly just because 2/3 of the hosts that the virus encounters are already immune.

On the other hand though, here's a study of dialysis patients that kind of confirms the 10x factor for at least the earlier hot spots: https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-per...-population-has-covid-19-antibodies-data-show

Substantial regional variation
They found that 8.2% to 9.4% of the sample had COVID-19 antibodies, indicating exposure to the virus. After comparing the estimates with case counts from Johns Hopkins University, the researchers calculated that about 9.3% of the US population had been infected, with regional variation ranging from less than 5% in the West to more than 25% in the Northeast. Less than 10% of those with antibodies had been tested for COVID-19 while ill.

Residents of counties that had implemented lockdowns resulting in at least a 5% reduction in visits to workplaces in March were 60% less likely than others to test positive for coronavirus antibodies in July.

Patients from early US coronavirus hot spots had a significantly higher likelihood of having evidence of a previous infection (33.6% in New York, 17.6% in Louisiana, and 17.5% in Illinois). In contrast, residents of lesser affected neighboring states were less likely to have antibodies (6.4% in Pennsylvania and 1.9% each in Arkansas and Missouri).

 

[eytonxav]

So the question becomes, will it ever be possible to irradiate this virus regardless of what we do preventative wise without getting to herd immunity or having an effective vaccine and getting enough people inoculated?

 

[NW-Bound]

We are still trying to flatten out the curve. And even if one is destined to die, having a few more months or another year is better than not.

There are still some dishes that I would like to try to make to enjoy for Thanksgiving and Christmas. I want to see the plants I am cultivating grow up. I have all kinds of microcontrollers I have not gotten around to write code for.

Taking some care when going out in public and curtailing some activities to enhance my chances is a small price to pay. Of course many people do not feel the same way, but then they are not introvert.

 

[Chuckanut]

Is there a website that shows how many ICU beds are currently occupied for each state?

The last I heard it's about 10% in Washington. I think that means 10% of the ICU beds are occupied by covid patients. For the most part Washington folk tend to wear masks even in situations where they aren't mandated. Those in the Eastern part of the state that had offered more resistance to masks are coming around.

If you love to dig through statistics here's a source of information.
Scroll a bit more than 1/2 way down and look for the map labeled:

State Representative Estimates for Percentage of Inpatient Beds Occupied by COVID-19 Patients

https://www.cdc.gov/nhsn/covid19/report-patient-impact.html

 

[pacergal]

Curious about this test. Is it a precaution asked for by the daycare or family just checking the situation..

you just pointed out the biggest issue with ongoing quarantine of young kids who have both parents work outside the home. How do they function normally when a 14 quarantine of any kid can happen at any time. I don't know the solution for that issue.

The quarantine and a negative test was required by the preschool, in order to return. They consulted with the Public Health Dept.and had to follow the protocol.

 

[audreyh1]

It’s getting really even scarier nationwide!

Daily cases have blasted though summer peaks. Just last week Nov 4 we had our first 100K+ cases day, but the 7 day average is well above 100K already, and daily cases are routinely exceeding 120K. This is just accelerating so quickly - parabolic. The New York Times graphics are sobering. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/coronavirus-us-cases.html

Daily deaths are creeping up more slowly.