Headlines focus on US position as #1 source of identified cases, fail to note we are the 3rd largest country in the world
US media are treating the coronavirus as though it were a sporting event, with a news blurb and headline focus on raw numbers. The focus on scary big numbers hides stories like this one from southwest Georgia.
Georgia is the ninth largest state in the country by population (10.6 million) and has 1,643 identified cases of COVID-19. That’s a rate of 155 cases/million. The national average is 259 cases/million (John Hopkins data).
There’s a regional hospital in the rural/agricultural southwest corner of the state reporting 217 positive cases, 16 deaths, and 1,319 people waiting for test results. It’s situated in Albany, the Dougherty County seat and the center of an SMA of about 160,000. [It’s also my hometown.]
Their case rate is almost an order of magnitude greater than the national average: 1,356/million or 1.4/thousand.
What’s the case rate in New York state? 1,915/million or 1.9/thousand. With a population of 19.5 million, that’s lot of sick people. But there are also lots of hospitals and medical workers.
Attention on New York is certainly appropriate. Their case rate exceeds both Italy (1.3/thousand) and Switzerland (1.4/thousand). You may not have known about the Swiss, however. It’s that absolute numbers game again: Italy has 60.5 million people and Switzerland, 8.7 million.
The Financial Times daily trends chart illustrates the extraordinarily different death rates between western and Asian countries. On Thursday the US passed China to hold the dubious honor of having more reported cases than any other nation in the world, although Italy has far more deaths (8,215 versus 1,296).
Politics: Trump wants the country open for Easter
Why should you listen to Bill Gates, philanthropist and former technology chief? Because he and his foundation have focused on global heath and epidemics (at least) since this 2015 TED talk.
Bill Gates: Entire country needs to shut down for 6-10 weeks to effectively fight coronavirus https://t.co/e5iuUgj8uV
— toddbishop (@toddbishop) March 27, 2020
Context: Gates is rejecting the Republican-led call to end stay-at-home orders, even though we have no national stay-at-home order. President Trump on Wednesday:
Easter’s a very special day for me. Wouldn’t it be great to have all of the churches full? … You’ll have packed churches all over our country. I think it would be a beautiful time.
The SARS-CoV-2 virus would think that “would be a beautiful time,” too.
Domestic situation
All 50 states, the District of Columbia, Guam, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands have identified COVID-19 cases. The 1,197 known deaths are from 42 states plus the District of Columbia, Guam, and Puerto Rico.
- Army Chief of Staff General James McConville confirms there are 288 confirmed coronavirus cases in the US Army, both civilians and soldiers. U.S. Army hospitals will be operational in New York next week.
Important essays
- If the idea of needing a ventilator for weeks to survive COVID-19 doesn’t make you quail, read this. Medium, Shasta Willson. 26 March 2020.
A neuropsychologist subsequently told me that being conscious while ventilated is equivalent to torture. Not just “it’s awful,” but that it actually results in trauma effects like PTSD, just as repeated waterboarding might.
- My Dad Has Coronavirus. I Don’t Know if I Should Say Goodbye. New York Times. 26 March 2020.
For weeks, he has been treating patients with the coronavirus. He has sent some home, knowing that they might come back. He has intubated others, easing breathing tubes down their throats and attaching those tubes to ventilators.
Original post on SubStack