COVID19 Update - Day 265

US Tests: 167,200,562*

US Cases: 13,337,969*

US Deaths: 259,075*

Worldwide Cases: 63,154,049*

Worldwide Deaths: 1,466,436*

* - Numbers are a lower bound.  True numbers are being suppressed by the Trump administration

More good news on the vaccine front.  It appears that Moderna's vaccine is about 95% effective in preventing the #TrumpVirus --- and 100% effective in preventing severe infection:

Of the 196 Covid-19 cases in the trial, 185 were in the placebo group and only 11 in the vaccine group, Moderna reported.

Even more important, the vaccine — called mRNA-1273 — appears to protect against severe disease, not just asymptomatic or mild cases. Of the 30 severe Covid-19 cases among trial participants, all occurred in the placebo group. If the finding is real, it would likely mean averted deaths and hospitalizations when millions of people are immunized.

“You’ve got 100 percent protection against severe disease,” Paul Offit, an infectious disease and vaccine researcher at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, told Vox. “That’s remarkable.”

“If these numbers are right, it’s more than we’d need for the vaccine to be a major control measure for this outbreak,” said Eric Rubin, an infectious disease specialist and the editor-in-chief of the New England Journal of Medicine.

Moderna’s CEO, Stéphane Bancel, said in the press release that the company plans to request an Emergency Use Authorization from the Food and Drug Administration, which would allow the vaccine to be used in limited cases for people facing some of the highest risk of exposure to Covid-19, like health care workers. “We believe that our vaccine will provide a new and powerful tool that may change the course of this pandemic and help prevent severe disease, hospitalizations and death,” he added.

 

COVID19 Update - Day 264

US Tests: 165,829,155*

US Cases: 13,188,777*

US Deaths: 257,920*

Worldwide Cases: 62,670,153*

Worldwide Deaths: 1,458,360*

* - Numbers are a lower bound.  True numbers are being suppressed by the Trump administration

Nothing much, just every member of the White House #TrumpVirus task force warning that the situation is about to get much, much worse, thanks to the general refusal of people to behave responsibly over Thanksgiving.  A sample:

During an interview on CBS, Birx warned that the country is “entering this post-Thanksgiving surge with three, four and 10 times as much disease across the country” compared to the “second wave” heading into Memorial Day weekend.

Birx recalled that there were less than 25,000 COVID-19 cases a day before Memorial Day weekend.

“We saw what happened post-Memorial Day. Now we are deeply worried about what could happen post-Thanksgiving because the number of cases, 25,000 versus 180,000 a day, that’s where — that’s why we are deeply concerned,” Birx said, before adding that there was some improvement in the Northern Plains states prior to the holiday. “And now with Thanksgiving, we’re worried that all of that will be reversed.”

 

COVID19 Update - Day 263

US Tests: 164,804,756*

US Cases: 13,053,244*

US Deaths: 257,106*

Worldwide Cases: 62,094,127*

Worldwide Deaths: 1,449,709*

* - Numbers are a lower bound.  True numbers are being suppressed by the Trump administration

The virus strikes close to home again.  About six weeks ago, I posted an email from my son, who's in his sophomore year of college, about a number of #TrumpVirus cases on his campus.  Like most college campuses, the virus found many welcoming hosts on his.

Ultimately, one of his roommates tested positive and moved into quarantine.  Amazingly, my son and his other roommate both tested negative.  So although my ex-wife and I both encouraged them to shelter in place (and we drove supplies up to them), they never formally quarantined.

On Wednesday, he cam home for Thanksgiving.  And we decided to bite the bullet and allow him back into our bubble without any kind of quarantine and so forth.  This may have been a mistake.

Yesterday --- the Friday after Thanksgiving --- we discovered that his OTHER roommate has tested positive.  Obviously, this meant our son would need another test.  Since he is on his mothers' insurance --- and since his mother and I are divorced --- she arranged the test without consulting me.  And it turns out the test she arranged for him is one of those 'rapid' #TrumpVirus tests.  It came back negative.

The negative result is somewhat reassuring, but --- as I discovered with a bit of research --- probably meaningless.  The reason is that my son is showing no symptoms of any kind:

The three tests are authorized for the most straightforward cases: people with COVID-19 symptoms in the first week of symptoms. That’s how they were validated. They produced virtually no false positives that way and were 84% to 97% as sensitive as lab tests, meaning they caught that range of the samples deemed positive by PCR.

Yet HHS allowed their use for large-scale asymptomatic screening without fully exploring the consequences, Pettengill said.

A recent study, not yet peer reviewed, found the Quidel test detected over 80% of cases when used on symptomatic people and those with known exposures to the virus, but only 32% among people without symptoms, The New York Times reported.

So there's a good chance his test was a false negative.  On the other hand, since he's asymptomatic, it's not clear that a more accurate PCR test would have returned a positive result (if he's infected).  It's my understanding that it takes about 5 days from exposure for tests to detect infection, and since he's asymptomatic, we have no idea about exactly when he was exposed.

For the sake of everyone's safety, I'm don't plan to be around anyone other than immediate family (all of whom have been exposed to my son) until at least 10 days after I was first exposed to him.  I think it's almost certain that one of us (out of three) will show symptoms during that time if he was infected and passed it along to us.

So --- the pandemic keeps life interesting. 

 

 

COVID19 Update - Day 262

US Tests: 163,385,651*

US Cases: 12,901,146*

US Deaths: 255,904*

Worldwide Cases: 61,585,651*

Worldwide Deaths: 1,441,875*

* - Numbers are a lower bound.  True numbers are being suppressed by the Trump administration

There's good news, and there's bad news.  First, the good news:

The CDC estimates there are 21 million healthcare personnel, 87 million essential workers, 100 million adults with high-risk medical conditions and 53 million others 65 and older. The federal government has said 40 million coronavirus vaccine doses could be available by the end of December.

Dr. Larry Corey of the University of Washington, who is heading up coronavirus vaccine clinical trials in the US, has said if both Pfizer and Moderna get vaccines authorized, they could supply 50 million more doses in January and 60 million more in February and March.

But here's the bad news (emphasis mine):

Those vaccines require two doses taken three to four weeks apart to be effective, so that would mean roughly enough vaccines to cover 75 million people by the end of March.

ACIP's priorities will help decide who gets access to those scarce vaccines first.

"The plan is to roll out doses of vaccines over the next few weeks to months in order to cover the 1a, 1b and 1c groups. There are not going to be sufficient vaccines for everybody in the first allotment," Romero said.

"It is important for the public to understand that we are dealing with select groups of individuals -- not the general public."

I completely understand the need to prioritize health-care workers and high-risk populations with vaccinations, and I also understand that it will take some time for vaccines to be produced and distributed.  However, I'm still a bit disappointed to see the expectation that ONLY about one-quarter of the U.S. population will be vaccinated by April 1.  I was hopeful that the pandemic would be largely finished by then.

*sigh* 

 

 

COVID19 Update - Day 261

US Tests: 161,682,011*

US Cases: 12,706,167*

US Deaths: 254,530*

Worldwide Cases: 60,856,294*

Worldwide Deaths: 1,429,689*

* - Numbers are a lower bound.  True numbers are being suppressed by the Trump administration

They'd better pray.  In the first Supreme Court decision since Amy Coney Barrett was confirmed, the court struck down a public safety ordinance in the state of New York limiting the number of people who can attend a church, mosque or synagogue:

In all, the late-night ruling consisted of six different opinions.

Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote his own concurrence -- joined by no other justice -- to explain his vote.

He said that other businesses such as bicycle repair shops, did not have similar restrictions.

"So, at least according to the Governor, it may be unsafe to go to church, but it is always fine to pick up another bottle of wine" or "shop for a new bike," Gorsuch wrote.

I'm not sure exactly what Neil Gorsuch does when he picks up a bottle of wine or shops for a new bike, but at least in my experience, it DOESN'T involve spending an hour or more indoors with a large group of people, and breaking into song on occasion.

I'm not a religious person, but I honestly don't know why any place of worship would WANT to continue holding in-person services during a pandemic, anyway.

Future generations will look back on this time as the time of the great stupid.

COVID19 Update - Day 260

US Tests: 160,710,709*

US Cases: 12,581,085*

US Deaths: 253,211*

Worldwide Cases: 60,258,815*

Worldwide Deaths: 1,418,610*

* - Numbers are a lower bound.  True numbers are being suppressed by the Trump administration

On a day when the U.S. recorded nearly 2,500 new #TrumpVirus deaths, let's try for hope instead of fear:

“There is real hope, tangible hope. So hang on. Don’t let yourself surrender to the fatigue,” Biden said in an address from Wilmington, Delaware, lauding the emergence of promising COVID-19 vaccines poised for distribution. He urged Americans to be vigilant in observing guidance issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to combat the spread of the coronavirus over the Thanksgiving holiday.

The message — mask-wearing and social-distancing, were not new — and yet President Trump who has bunkered strongly since his electoral defeat has remained largely silent in his leadership on curbing the virus even as coronavirus deaths have topped more than a quarter-million in the U.S.

“America is not going to lose this war. You will get your lives back. Life is going to return to normal,” Biden said.

The incoming President offered a thinly-veiled criticism of President Trump’s pandemic response, suggesting that none of the science-driven guidance that would be put forward in the coming months as he takes his place in the White House would take sides in a partisan fight. 

“None of these steps we’re asking people to take are political statements,” Biden said. “Every one of them is based in science.”

The comments which were consistent with remarks the President-elect made after he was declared the projected winner of the presidential election on Nov. 7, when he said that he would “marshal the forces of science” to battle the coronavirus pandemic. At that time he vowed to make a national pandemic response his top priority even before he is inaugurated as President.

The remarks on Wednesday were a sharp departure from President Donald Trump’s continuous efforts to undermine the wisdom of scientists and health experts within his own administration with regard to battling the coronavirus pandemic.

It's easy to look at Biden's speech, check the calendar, and conclude that anything he does will be too little, too late.  But the more optimistic view is that a president who takes the pandemic seriously is FAR better than one who suggested injecting disinfectant into the lungs.

COVID19 Update - Day 259

US Tests: 159,365,449*

US Cases: 12,397,144*

US Deaths: 250,925*

Worldwide Cases: 59,939,306*

Worldwide Deaths: 1,412,669*

* - Numbers are a lower bound.  True numbers are being suppressed by the Trump administration

No additional news tonight.  Because reasons.