COVID19 Update - Day 37

US Tests: 3,401,064
US Cases: 663,260
US Deaths: 30,296
Worldwide Cases: 2,152,647
Worldwide Deaths: 143,802

Rather than beating the corpse of the long-dead horse which is Trump's abysmal handling of the pandemic, tonight I want to focus on things a bit closer to home.  Specifically my home, Minnesota.

To begin with, Minnesota has formally entered into a coalition with Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio and Kentucky, to coordinate their response to the pandemic:

The governors said in a statement announcing the coalition: “We are doing everything we can to protect the people of our states and slow the spread of COVID-19, and we are eager to work together to mitigate the economic crisis this virus has caused in our region. Here in the Midwest, we are bound by our commitment to our people and the community. We recognize that our economies are all reliant on each other, and we must work together to safely reopen them so hardworking people can get back to work and businesses can get back on their feet.”

The statement says the states will “closely examine” at least four factors before reopening:

They include “sustained control” of the rate of new infections and hospitalizations; enhanced ability to test and trace; “sufficient health care capacity” to handle any resurgence; and “best practices” for social distancing.

Today’s announcement comes as President Donald Trump is soon to unroll his plan to reopen the national economy.

The statement seems to go out of its way to underline that state CEOs, and not someone else, will decide what’s right for their residents, and that health will be the top consideration.

The states “will work in close coordination to reopen our economies in a way that prioritizes our workers' health,” the joint statement says. “We look forward to working with experts and taking a fact-based, data-driven approach to reopening our economy in a way that protects families from the spread of COVID-19.”

This is the third such coalition, following the lead of the Northeast coalition (New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Massachusetts and Delaware) and the West Coast coalition (California, Oregon and Washington).  It goes without saying that the reason the states are doing this is because Trump has completely abdicated any kind of leadership in this time of crisis.

Okay, I guess I'll beat the horse a little bit.

And in a rare piece of good news, the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN has announced that they are able to process enough coronavirus tests to reopen business in the state of Minnesota:

Mayo Clinic officials said Tuesday that the health giant has enough testing capacity to meet Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz's benchmarks to reopen businesses after a weeks-long near-shutdown over the coronavirus pandemic.

The Post Bulletin reports on the announcement by Mayo's Dr. William Morice, who chairs the clinic's Department of the Department of Laboratory Medicine. Morice said Mayo could produce 8,000 daily molecular or diagnostic tests to detect infected individuals as well as 10,000 serological tests that can screen for patients who already had the disease.

There are only two ways life gets back to normal.  Either a vaccine is developed, or sufficient testing is available so that all infected individuals can be quarantined while everyone else goes about their lives.  And since a vaccine is still 12 to 18 months away, massively increased testing is our best hope for returning to business as usual any time soon.

As a Minnesotan, obviously this news from the Mayo Clinic is very hopeful indeed.