COVID19 Update - Day 13

US Tests: 279,485
US Cases: 42,164
US Deaths: 471
Worldwide Cases: 378,287
Worldwide Deaths: 16,497

The Idiot in Chief continues to do idiotic things:

On Monday, Trump began sending retweets that seem to be encouraging an end to strong social distancing measures after the current 15-day period, despite concern from public health officials that it won't be long enough to blunt the worst of the coronavirus.

Remarkably, Trump (and the uncredentials know-nothings he chooses to retweet) still don't seem to fully grasp the seriousness of the situation.  In one week, the number of COVID19 deaths in the U.S. has jumped from 71 to 471 (a 660% increase), and the number of confirmed cases has jumped from 4,018 to 42,164 (a 1050% increase).  If the disease keeps spreading at this rate, then by the time Idiot Boy wants to drop all social distancing and reopen the economy for business on March 30, we'll be at 442,460 cases and 3,124 deaths --- and opening things up again will ACCELERATE the pain and death!

Idiot Boy still refuses to invoke the Defense Production Act in order to make sure there are enough gloves, masks, tests and ventilators.  And really, at this point, it's too late to ever have ENOUGH of them.  But every day he waits will eventually add a few thousand to the final death toll.

But at least he has a completely ghoulish reason for holding off:

Shortly after announcing he would be invoking the Defense Production Act, the White House received pushback from business leaders who expressed concern that the act which could cause major unforeseen problems, including profit loss.

Even when the lives of thousands, possibly millions of Americans are at stake, Trump never forgets his top priority: maximizing profits.

And not to be a broken record, but Senate Republicans are just as bad.  Instead of passing the bipartisan coronavirus relief bill passed by the House TEN DAYS AGO, they passed their own bill which, among other things, includes $500 billion for Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin to spend however he likes:

As Senate Democrats went to the floor Sunday night to vote — the first time they’d been there in days — they had one thing on their minds: a secret “slush fund” for Corporate America.

That’s what Democrats are calling a $500 billion “Exchange Stabilization Fund” included in the massive Senate GOP proposal to rescue the U.S. economy from the coronavirus crisis. The fund, which would come under the control of Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, is designed to aid distressed industries. It includes $58 billion for U.S. airline and air cargo companies, a source of significant controversy during the last three days of closed-door talks between senators of both parties and the White House.

But the language drafted by Senate Republicans also allows Mnuchin to withhold the names of the companies that receive federal money and how much they get for up to six months if he so decides.

No personal news worth sharing today.  Still working from home, still bored.  But I'm feeling healthy, and so I scheduled an appointment to give blood next Wednesday.