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| Mom and Me in the Time Before. June, 2017 |
Today is Mother's Day and I'm not with my mom. To be fair, even without the virus it's unlikely I would have been with her. She's in Florida, and I'm up here in Ohio so the chances that I would have made the weekend trip for Mother's Day is pretty slim (not least because originally we had plans for a drama tour in Dayton, Ohio this weekend--cancelled due to the virus). Still, for the past few years I'd been trying to make it a point to take an extra trip or two each year in addition to our annual summer visit and every-other-Christmas trip to Florida, just to see Mom. I would have probably made the trip in March or April this year if COVID-19 hadn't interevened. Now I'm not sure when I'll get to make the trip. Still I am grateful that while I can't be with her today, she is still with us today. I know there are many who cannot say the same.
It's hard to know what to do--to know what's safe and what's foolhardy. Just because we are allowed to do something doesn't mean we should. I naively thought things would reopen when the virus was contained. And I was optimistic that the scourge would pass quickly. China had what two and a half months? I figured by the end of May we should be just about done. It doesn't look that way at all now. The gentle downward slope of new cases and deaths so far doesn't seem to be materializing. I can't stand the thought of not being able to visit my mother (and my siblings) this summer. But even worse is the thought of bringing her something more than my love with me and passing it on.
Right now the tentative plan is to watch those new cases rather than follow the guidelines of governments desperate to revive our floundering economy. Hopefully I won't be missing mom this summer.
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| While I couldn't be with my mother on Mother's Day, Barbara's mom lives close enough that we were able to drive down to surprise her this morning. We spent a couple of pleasant hours social-distance visiting. It was great to see her again after several months! |
For the first time since I began these dispatches, I missed my third day post. This post should have gone up last night, and in fact I completed my graphs and collected my benchmark state date late yesterday afternoon. But I was never able to complete the entry. Still when I checked the New York Times updates for the U.S numbers this morning their latest update was from 12:22 AM which is right when I would have been probably posted last night anyway if I'd been able to keep my eyes open.
So, here's where we stand. As of Saturday night, there have been 1,316, 400+ people in the United States infected with the Coronavirus. That represents a 7% increase since last Wednesday. For the first time in quite awhile the number of cases exceeded my prediction--by about 8,000 cases. Could this be the beginning of expected upswing as the U.S. rushes to reopen? Presumably by the end of this next week, the consequences of re-opening should begin to fully manifest themselves. There have been 78,763 deaths, an 8.5% increase. This marks the second time in a row that the three day rate of increase has gone up. Again, my projections were low by just about 500.
My new projections for Tuesday, May 12, are 1,408,548 total cases and 85,458 total deaths.
Moving on to the states. Florida and Ohio have exchanged places. Over the last three days in both new cases and new deaths, Florida swung up while Ohio seesawed down. This time it's Florida's turn to rocket off the death chart, with 245 people losing their lives in connection with the virus in that state. Meanwhile Nebraska's case count continues climb after a momentary drop three days ago. Thankfully the number of deaths in Nebraska doesn't appear to be matching the new cases' upward trajectory, averaging around 7.5 deaths every three days over the past month. I'm not sure what to make of the zig-zag pattern of Florida and Ohio. Looking at the whole graph of new cases there does seem to be an overall downward trend since March 31 Neither state has come close to their mid-April peaks so far, and this could suggest a gradual decline. I think we'll know more by the end of May or early June when the impact of the reopening is more evident.
Total Cases:
Florida: 39,993 cases, 0.18% of the population.
Ohio: 23,018 cases, 0.2% of the population
Nebraska: 7,831 cases, 0.4% of the population
The new deaths in Ohio and Florida on the other hand look different. None of the states, not even Nebraska has ever dropped below their initial new death count when I began tracking the date on March 31 (although Ohio came closest on April 27). The overall trajectory seems to be up for at least the two more populous states, with both states showing wild swings up and down. Perhaps this is simply the sad conclusion for some of the patients diagnosed back around April 18 or 21 when both states had some of their highest spikes in new cases. Based on the new case trajectory in the weeks that followed, we should see the number of new deaths for both cases begin a broadly downward trend in the next few weeks.
Total Deaths
Florida: 1,715, a rate of 4.3%
Ohio: 1,306, a rate of 5.7%
Nebraska: 93, a rate of 1.2%
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