Corona-zona

  Here are Arizona pandemic numbers for the week ending February: For the first time since January 30, we have a red number in the table, albeit just a slight increase in the seven-day average of positive tests.  This in itself wouldn't be worrisome. As discussed in an earlier post , positive test data is based on a self-selected sample and tests are not done in high enough numbers to give an accurate picture of infections.  Also as mentioned previously , the reporting procedures for these test results are questionable. But in addition this small uptick in positive tests, the CDC has expressed concern that the downward trend in cases may be stalling. The four week trend in Maricopa County new cases (from the  ASU Biodesign dashboard ) backs this up: Over the last week the numbers have crept down slightly, but the trajectory obviously changed on the 19th. In another bit of less-than-great news, Arizona had a smaller increase in shots-in-arms over the past week. ...

  Today's post is by Senior Europe Correspondent  Maria Iovine In Germany there’s an expression— Wer viel misst, misst viel Mist —i f you measure a lot, you measure a lot of crap ( Mist ) . That’s something like the German version of "figures lie and liars figure."  We have been awash in a giant sea of pandemic data for longer than ever expected. News, stats, charts, graphs, you name it. It’s exhausting, even if you love numbers.  New types of stats emerge almost daily. The latest is the number of vaccinations administered…or is that produced? Or delivered but not yet administered? Shots in arms . It sounds like the new boots on the ground . But I digress.   As a US expat living in Europe, I have the double whammy of comparing the EU to the US, or Germany’s population to California’s. Trying to get to some useful vaccination numbers, I compare my German state, Baden-Württemberg, to Colorado, Virginia, or Arizona—wherever seems like home. Then there’s county l...

  The New York Times is maintaining an infection tracker page for U.S. Colleges and Universities. It's a great example of how such dashboards are meant to inform people but often paint incomplete, and sometimes misleading , pictures of the pandemic. The main feature of the NYT tracker is a list of states and colleges/universities in them, and the number of infections in each (along with some historical trends).  Here is what the top part looks like for yesterday, with the Arizona item expanded: As you can see, the primary numbers are "cases." This data makes the state schools look like disaster areas, particularly Arizona State.  But As I have noted before , using the right numbers is critical. Total cases are practically never the right numbers, especially when you are making comparisons.  For example, ASU is one of the largest public universities in the country, so you would expect it to have a lot more cases than a smaller school like NAU. In an attempt to accoun...

  A study recently published in PLOS One by a team of researchers from University of Louisville, Johns Hopkins University, and the U.S. Department of Defense Joint Artificial Intelligence Center looked at the relationship between temperature and COVID-19. They found 61% of the variation in confirmed COVID-19 cases could be explained by variation in the daily low temperature. That is called an "effect size" and it's a pretty high figure for research of this type. The research is based on a theory that SARS-CoV-2 virus particles persist longer in colder and dryer environments than in warm, humid ones. It turns out that this is the latest in a slew of studies looking at this question (search "temperature and coronavirus transmission"). There is wild variability in their results, with some researchers concluding there no relationship , others saying there is a modest relationship , with others, like the current one, concluding there is a big relationship. Because I...

  Not to ruin your day or anything, but  The Guardian (and other news sites) recently reported that a new strain of avian influenza has been reported in Russia, which for the first time has spread to humans. It has also appeared in poultry in Europe, China, the Middle East and north Africa in recent months. The strain is an H5N8 variant. The "H5" refers to a particular type of HA surface glycoprotein. This is worrisome. According to a recent  study published in the journal Viruses, "[h]umans have no pre-existing immunity to H5 or H7 avian influenza viruses. Thus, if an H5 or H7 virus is introduced into the human population and can spread between people, particularly via the airborne route, it will initiate a pandemic." Awesome! You may recall that there was a pandemic scare in 2005-2008, when another variant, H5N1 spread like wildfire among birds in Europe, Africa and Asia. Fortunately, that variant never got good at infecting humans and spreading between them. ...

  After getting  totally scoope d  on mask fitters by this blog, Popular Mechanics has done a  me-too story  about them. They did have a few interesting value-added items though.  First, they cited a University of Iowa  study  that says masks secured with fitters were not as good as N95 masks. That study is already published and disagrees with the one I  reviewed  in January, which is still not published. As far as I can tell, the Iowa study didn't measure actual particle filtration, and is basing this conclusion on ASTM filtration figures for procedure masks.  Second, they present some interesting ideas about making fitters out of rubber bands and paper clips. Third, they reported on a company that can make a mask fitter for your own personal face. It uses a scan of your face generated by an Apple device with Face ID (sorry Android users). This information is used to drive a 3-D printer that makes a customized brace. Perhaps Corona...

  NPR has posted a very cool page with a working simulation of viral infection by mock disease called SIMVID-19 that you can run yourself.  There are several different versions showing how infections spread (or not) when 5%, 30%, and 75% of the population is vaccinated. You push a button and it shows how the disease spreads. There are different scenarios where different starting assumptions—called parameters in agent-based modeling—are varied. For example they show what happens when there is a more infectious disease, when more of the population has had the disease already, and so on. The simulation is an example of  cellular automation .  There is a grid of cells (here representing people) that have some initial state (in this case vaccinated, uninfected, and infected). The simulation proceeds through a number of rounds, where the state of each cell is updated based on rules that take account of the states of neighboring cells.   In this case there is a ...

  Here are Arizona pandemic numbers for the week ending February 20: The numbers continue heading in the right direction. Almost one-fifth of the population has now had at least one vaccination.  Perhaps this is a reason the case rates and positive test percentage continue to decline. Studies by Mayo Clinic  (awaiting review)and Israeli researchers both claim high effectiveness after one shot. Here is this week's AZ Vaccination Accelerometer: The slope for "any shot" increases a little from last week, indicating that we are indeed accelerating. Congrats to the state officials running the operation for showing improvement.  Errata Earlier weekly pandemic numbers reports contained an error in the calculation of the statewide new cases. That error has been corrected and previous weeks' tables have been updated. Top Image by  Shutterbug75  from  Pixabay

Today's post is by Corona-zona Senior Canada Correspondent Salishsailor While I wait for the border between the United States and Canada to reopen, I keep track of how our boreal neighbor and its provinces have been managing the pandemic.  My wife and I are planning to pull up roots in Idaho and replant them in British Columbia as soon as the border opens. That’s where you’ll find Canada's  best climate and one of its most socially progressive populations .  I’ve lived most of my life in the US, the country of my birth. In the 1990s I lived in Spain for half a year and, prior to that, in Japan for two years. But I’ve never lived north of the border, even though I’m a Canadian citizen. So, naturally I would want to compare Canada’s record with the US. It’s clear that Canada’s effort to control the invasion of the coronavirus and limit the number of COVID-19 cases beat the Trump Administration’s actions—by a wide margin.   According to Our World In Data , the US...

Here are some updates on recent Corona-zona posts. Vaccine Supplies Last Sunday, I noted the increasing pace of vaccinations here in State 48.  According to Bloomberg , the U.S. is delivering about 1.6 million doses a week. Johnson & Johnson does not have as much inventory as anticipated. Nonetheless, the pace should start picking up. Manufacturers have promised enough doses by the end of June to vaccinate all Americans. Of course, manufacturers delivering doses is only the first step. They have to make their way to the states. It seems that the recent cold weather has delayed some of the shipments to Arizona. Who Gets Shots? There have been many reports about minority groups not getting vaccinated at the same rate as the majority group.  As noted in last Sunday's  by-the-numbers report , this is true in Arizona, where blacks and Latinos are getting vaccinated at about a quarter the rate that their share of the population would suggest. On the other hand, the Navaj...

  Last night's PBS Newshour had a segment containing an interview with Dr. Paul Farmer .  He's co-founder of Partners in Health , an organization focused on bringing "the benefits of modern medical science to those most in need."  He and his organization have been involved in Ebola epidemics in Africa. In this segment he compares and contrasts the response to Ebola in Africa and the response to SARS-CoV-2 here in the United States.   Among other things, he says here we have "failed differently" due to "containment nihilism, in other words, a refusal to do contact tracing, to invest adequately in public health responses." The six-minute segment is worth a watch (or a read of the transcript, if you prefer). Image by  bhossfeld  from  Pixabay  

  As noted in an earlier post , right now it's the wild west out there when it comes to masks. It seems they are hyped based on everything except how well they work filtering virus-size particles.   Now, the  American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) has come to the rescue with a new set of standards for "barrier face coverings," known to most of us commoners as masks. If you follow that link you will be required—for reasons unclear to me—to go through a registration process that includes providing your address and phone number and verifying your email before you can see the standards.  I registered and got the document so you don't have to. There are basically three important parts to the standard, requirements for design, testing, and labeling.  Design Requirements Masks must cover the nose and mouth.  They can't have valves or other things that allow unfiltered breath to escape. They have to say if they're one-size-fits-all or sized for d...

On Valentine's Day, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis appeared on a Fox News (of course) interview to complain that his policies aren't getting the respect they deserve for keeping its economy humming by mostly ignoring virus mitigation. Before we begin, let's assess the credibility of the source we're talking about.  First, DeSantis is governor of Florida, a place where politics are equal parts stupid and dangerous.  Second, DeSantis is a Trump sycophant who supported the Big Lie that the last election was stolen. He said misleading things in his interview too. He repeatedly called President Biden a "lockdowner," even though Biden has never proposed locking down anything. He said Transportation Secretary Buttigieg and the CDC want to impose domestic travel restrictions. He conveniently left out that two days before his interview the White House said they were considering no such thing .  Third, he persecutes people who question his disinformation.  This summer ...

  [Today's post is by Corona-zona Senior Southeast Asia Correspondent PBR] A report from Singapore? On COVID? You got it! Why? Because I am bored out of my brains. Unlike others , I can’t embrace boredom. Humanity is a doing thing. And boredom is doing my head in.   COVID-19 is not as much of a problem if you are on a roomy island with awesome outdoors and can manage incoming folk (like New Zealand, but certainly not the UK ).  COVID-19 sucks if you are on an island that is 280 sq miles with a population of almost 6 million.  For perspective, that’s about a quarter of the size of Rhode Island and with almost six times the population. With fewer White folk. Socially, things are a tad rubbish for interaction, but it’s not like the rest of the world. Cinemas are open if you want to be in an enclosed space with folk for an hour and a half. Alcoholics can rejoice as early shutting hours for pubs have led to beer deals in the afternoon .   Beaches are open, though y...

  Here are Arizona pandemic numbers for the week ending February 13: All the numbers continue heading in the right direction. Vaccination Pace Improving This week the governor announced that that state has put over over a million doses in a million arms.  And it shows in an upward swing in this week's Vaccination Accelerometer: Despite the increase, Arizona is not going a good job of vaccinating minority groups.  According to this report , blacks and Latinos make up 35% of the state's population, but have received only 9% of the vaccinations. The ADHS director attributes this partly to the focus on certain occupation groups at the beginning. Update 2/14/21 This post was updated at 1:13 MST to reflect a corrected accelerometer graph. Update 2/21/21 The data table was updated to correct a calculation error in statewide new cases. Top Image by  Shutterbug75  from  Pixabay

It's been a big week for mask news.  I continue to see stories like this on my news feed, promoting everything making a mask good except its filtration ability. Experts are saying we really should be thinking more about that, with the new, more contagious mutations and all. Government standards for masks are on the way and may help people make better decisions. One way to up your mask game is by double-masking.  The CDC is now recommending  it. A test done here at Corona-zona Labs found that double-masking does improve leakage, though not nearly as well as a mask fitter . Another thing you can do is get an N95 mask. The CDC has not changed its recommendation that N95s should only be worn by medical professionals.  This is because of a supposed shortage .  I say "supposed," because this company  says it has 30 million it made but can't sell. If you are looking for N95, beware of fakes.  The feds have conducted over 1000 raids in an investigation o...

I recently heard an  interview with Dr. Emily Landon of the University of Chicago medical school. She was clearly astonished at the low rate of flu this year. "At the University of Chicago, we just registered our third flu case of the season. Usually at this time of year we have over a hundred each week." Great, I thought. At least one good outcome of the pandemic is that all the mitigation measures we've taken for the coronavirus are knocking down the flu as well.  But to prove that there is nothing whatsoever good about the pandemic, public health people are saying there is a problem. Because so few people got the normal illnesses like the flu this year, more people will be susceptible in coming years. This could lead to large outbreaks and also off-season outbreaks, according to a study by Princeton epidemiologists, just as soon as we back off of coronavirus mitigation measures.    It seems this is already happening in Australia with a common respiratory virus c...

  You can't fix stupid. There's not a pill you can take; there's not a class you can go to.  R. White Anti-vaxxers continue to exploit their Big Chance with the pandemic and are amping-up rhetoric to dangerous levels.  Their latest move is to claim that people administering vaccinations are violating the Nuremberg Code and are therefore international war criminals.  They are posting videos and notices like this on social media: Their "theory" is that the SARS-CoV-2 is "experimental" and therefore prohibited under the Code.  This is such a stupid argument because the vaccine is a, y'know, vaccine, not an experiment. Numerous debunkers have gone into detail debunking this asshatery, like here , and here , and here .  It would be funny if it weren't also dangerous. As noted in an earlier post , COVIDiots have already been harassing a nurse who they're sure died from the vaccine. But this war-crimes frame turns things up a notch or two. As a pr...

In an earlier post , I noted that American Indian communities, particularly those on reservations, have been getting hammered by the pandemic. I suggested that this may be one reason why Arizona's numbers have looked so bad compared to other mountain west states like Colorado. Here is a graph from the ASU Biodesign dashboard comparing new cases per 100K people, 7-day moving average, for Navajo and Apache counties (green and blue lines, respectively, with large reservation populations) with Maricopa county (maroon line, holding 60% of the state's population): At most time points the Apache and Navajo have higher rates than Maricopa, sometimes by a lot.   For fatalities the situation is even worse. The Guardian recently ran a story on how the pandemic is decimating American Indian and Alaskan Native communities. They have an interactive chart showing that, in Arizona, American Indians die at more than twice the rate per 100K people as do the next highest groups (whites, and La...