Through yesterday Michigan's graph of new cases is decidedly down while Texas and Wisconsin's graph of new cases is decidedly up. Michigan still has things pretty well locked down and the other two of course do not. We need to see all three down to start to feel more comfortable with a full reopening....at least that is the goal. You know it's not the fact of reopening that's the key factor.... it's how people behave when they do. The push now is for churches to reopen.... And if you had worshippers 6 feet apart front, back and sides then maybe that could work. If they pack em in like always with no distancing then that cannot be a good thing for new infections.
Wisconsin had six deaths yesterday....Michigan had 69. What does it mean? Probably nothing. Apples and oranges. Texas is pretty flat line. Are the case increases due to increased testing or easing up restrictions? Will increases in death rates follow? Hopefully not. BTW Michigan's case numbers have also been increasing slightly over the past week. Most churches will be following best practices. Some unfortunately will not. My church is opening May 31 using alternate pews and seating, no singing hymns or choir (soloist only), hand sanitizer everywhere, bins to throw away bulletins,and only outdoor social hour afterwards with social distancing. There will always be snake handlers.
One thing Stu is that being much less populated Wi. will have less overall cases and less deaths than will Michigan. But I think yesterday they both had around the same number of new cases..... which is staying down for Michigan but staying in the upper reaches for Wi. because of that population differential.
Michigan’s population is roughly 10M while Wisconsin is 6M number of cases- M 53,913. W 14396 deaths M 14396. W 496 The different results are astounding even when factoring the population disparity.Both states had tight lockdowns after the virus hit.
So Bobda if new cases in Michigan yesterday were 403 which they were then a similar rate of new infections for Wi. should be 60% of that or 240. Instead the rate of new infections yesterday in Wi. was more than twice that at 511. If that continues in that pattern it's pretty alarming for Wi. vs Mi. On the other hand Texas' population is three times that of Michigan and the new rate of infection in Texas was about three times as many as Michigan at 1181..... so about the same in both states as a percentage of the total state population.
I look more at the percentage of positive tests since increased testing in the state will result in more positive results. The average has been at 5%. Yesterday was 6.8 which was less that the 8% on 5/20. Unfortunately, it looks like positive case percentages are ticking upwards.
That percentage of those tested Bobda ticking up plus the toal number of new cases when taken with the total population isn't so good for Wisconsin...... or for the case of opening up. I'm just hoping Memorial weekend doesn't cause a real spike nationally..... because I agree with Trump on this one... we can't go backwards.
Trying to put the country back to work and allow people the freedom to feed their families and keep their homes and jobs was never going to decrease the number of cases. So far opening up seems to have a small enough effect that we are debating what effect it has had. I only hope and pray that continues.
My wife and I were driving through Clearwater Beach and Indian Rocks Beach looking for a place not too busy to have our first meal out since early March to celebrate our 40th Anniversary and there were lots of cars in parking lots and no place seemed only 50% full. Also many bars (with food) had lumps of people standing around.... not looking too safely distanced. And that's how it is.... it's kinda of a crap shoot and you're taking chances when you go out. But it is what it is..... and shutting down again for any reason would be a terrible option. The thing about Wisconsin is that some bars are wide open.... and pics online have people crowded in next to each other without any enforcement of social distancing etc.so if the rate of infection in Wi. remains higher than others then they have invited it.
Yeah I don't think we would have been eating out yesterday even except it is our 40th.... so we just about had to. We're glad we did but now we are back to staying home and seeing what happens in about 7-12 days from this Memorial weekend....
The end of the week saw real spikes in new cases in Texas, Fla and Wi....... all states liberally opening up. Not a good trend at all.
Hydroxychloroqine still no help in preventing Covid 19 per study just out: https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2016638
This is from the study "Whether preexposure prophylaxis would be effective in high-risk populations is a separate question, with trials ongoing. In order to end the pandemic, a reduction in community transmission is needed." The trial did not give it BEFORE exposure therefore it didn't determine if it could PREVENT the disease. Must you keep proving how uninformed you are time and again?
There is still hope for hydroxychloroquine. It certainly isn't going to be a panacea and I'm beginning to think that maybe it isn't going to help at all...but it IS an approved drug (off label use is NOT illegal), there ARE reports and a debated study that say it helps, and it's potential risks are known (and over-emphasized in my view by Trump opponents.) Instead of keeping an open mind, Dave, you are continually harping on this because you think somehow it scores points against Trump. This isn't a "points" contest. This isn't something where we should be rooting for who can shove what up somebody's ass when the definitive study comes out disproving (or proving) it. There are still studies ongoing and many physicians treating COVID patients prescribe it...albeit in a "couldn't hurt but might help" scenario. Latest article I saw yesterday still hasn't "debunked" it; Coronavirus treatments: Here's what you need to know “There’s less thought that it’s going to be effective in people who have more severe disease, but there are still several large, ongoing clinical trials looking at it, so we may still find it provides a benefit.”
I just post the study results Stu.... not hoping for bad outcomes. Gipper..... if there is no exposure how in the hell would you know if the drug could prevent catching the virus?? "We enrolled adults who had household or occupational exposure to someone with confirmed Covid-19 at a distance of less than 6 ft for more than 10 minutes while wearing neither a face mask nor an eye shield (high-risk exposure) or while wearing a face mask but no eye shield (moderate-risk exposure). Within 4 days after exposure, we randomly assigned participants to receive either placebo or hydroxychloroquine (800 mg once, followed by 600 mg in 6 to 8 hours, then 600 mg daily for 4 additional days). The primary outcome was the incidence of either laboratory-confirmed Covid-19 or illness compatible with Covid-19 within 14 days.