Corona-zona

  Here is the Arizona pandemic numbers summary and graph of seven-day average of new cases for the week just ended*: Case rates are in the green both statewide and in Maricopa County. The graph shows we topped out on January 24 and are coming down. That's almost exactly when the modelers predicted  it would happen. The only cautionary note is that during the Delta wave there was a false peak at the end of August after which  things seemed to be coming down, only to ramp back up and surpass that rate a little in early December.  Let's hope that doesn't happen again because of the "stealth" Omicron . It has been detected in Arizona and is estimated by Danish researchers to be 50% more transmissible. If we have passed the peak, it was some peak. Previously, the worst seven-day average for Arizona was in January 12, 2021 at 9,808 cases. The peak on January 24, 2022 was 20,778, more than two times higher! Deaths are in the red. The media are freaking out about it. B...

  Governor Ron "Florida Man" DeSantis is picking a new fight with the Biden administration over antibody treatments. Whereas before he was bitching about not being allowed to hog them, now he's bitching about not being allowed to waste them. Antibodies treatments for COVID-19 are a big deal in Florida. That state has a surplus of politically-motivated individuals who refuse to be vaccinated, and there is a huge overlap between this group and the group of people who vote for the governor. Last year DeSantis and other Lemon Socialist governors were hawking antibody treatments  as the perfect solution for saving their COVIDiot supporters. Florida was hoovering up all the Regeneron doses it could get, way more than its share. Then back in September the Biden administration took steps to ensure more equitable distribution of these doses among states. DeSantis promptly threw a hissy-fit . Fast-forward to the past week, when the FDA has rescinded its Emergency Use Authorization...

  There is a new variant spreading that people are calling "stealth" Omicron. It is a variant of of the existing Omicron variant. According to the Washington Post  the variant has been detected in many countries, and this includes India, Britain, and Denmark. Three U.S. cases have been detected at a hospital in Houston. The virus is similar to Omicron, labeled BA.1 by researchers, but contains some mutations that make it different. The reason is it called "stealth" is that,  according to the UK Health Services Agency: Omicron BA.2 lacks the genetic deletion on the spike protein which produces S-gene target failure (SGTF) in some polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests, which has been used as a proxy for Omicron cases previously.    This is also known as an "s-gene dropout" and you have seen it referred to in this blog before. Variants that have this feature can be quickly identified in the course of processing PCR tests. If a variant does not have the fea...

  Cochise County (CC) is in the Southeastern-most part of the state and encompasses Bisbee, Sierra Vista, and Wilcox. A story  recently published on tuscon.com about pandemic relief funds came to my attention the other day.  For a little context, CC was particularly hard-hit by COVID-19 over the fall. Its cases per 100K  exceeded those for Maricopa County (MC), according to the ASU dashboard .  Now, whereas case rates in MC and the state overall appear to have peaked , in CC they are still increasing. Today it has about 27% more cases per 100K (seven-day average) than the state's largest county. Against this backdrop the CC Board of Supervisors were considering an intergovernmental agreement with the Arizona Department of Health Services that would have provided them $1.9M in funds to help deal with the pandemic. The CC Health Services Director explained that the money was needed for things like additional personnel, equipment, mobile community health services,...

  Here is the Arizona pandemic numbers summary and new cases seven-day average chart for the week just ended: Compared to last week , there are some things to like here. Statewide new cases are down (though Maricopa County cases are up). This is reflected in the statewide seven-day average graph, which shows signs of leveling off. Normally I wouldn't be so eager to call a possible peak, but it has been happening elsewhere, especially in the Eastern U.S.  Here is the latest Twitter thread from virologist Trevor Bedford (who I've linked before) from last Wednesday.   Hi first chart shows that cases peaked in the U.S. overall a week ago. His second chart shows that in most states west of the Mississippi, including Arizona, the peak hasn't arrived yet. But he is analyzing  data is from a week ago, so maybe the above chart really is signaling a peak. We can only hope. Deaths per 100K are down fractionally both in the state and Maricopa County, but again those lag in...

  I already mentioned this issue when I  blogged about testing a few weeks ago. But it bears repeating and emphasizing now the the Biden administration is distributing free antigen test kits to everybody. Starting yesterday, a day ahead of schedule, the Post Office began taking orders for the test kits. You can get four per address, which to be honest doesn't sound like enough for bigger households. Something to know about these tests is that although they are fast, they are not very accurate compared to PCR tests, which take days to process. So says a review of studies (sometimes called a meta-analysis) published not quite a year ago. They compiled the results of different studies done on different brands of rapid tests, which compared antigen test results to PCR test results on samples taken from the same people at the same time. Here is part of their "plain language" summary: In people with confirmed COVID‐19, antigen tests correctly identified COVID‐19 infection in...

A study just published in Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications looked at the effects of male facial occlusion on judgments of attractiveness by females. The effects were the same for both attractive and unattractive men. The researchers got pictures of low- and high-attractiveness male faces covered with a medical mask, a cloth mask, a book, or nothing (see header pic). They then asked females to rate how attractive the faces were. Here is how the ratings came out: Basically, any covered face was significantly more attractive (meaning the difference is unlikely to be due to chance) than the uncovered face. This was true both for attractive and unattractive faces.   This lack of difference between baseline attractiveness surprised the researchers. I suppose they reckoned that hiding features of an ugly face would work better than hiding those of a handsome face, but nope. Also the medical mask was rated as significantly more attractive than the other two coverings....

  Here is the Arizona pandemic numbers summary for the week ending January 15 and the statewide new cases seven-day average graph: Well, read it and weep. The seven-day average of cases continues to rocket upward. Cases statewide increased almost 2.5X over the week. I suppose it's slightly encouraging that they are up only 1.7X in the state's largest county.  Deaths are only up fractionally, though as I noted last week those tend to lag new cases by quite a bit.  Hospitalizations are up 10% over a month and 4% over a week.  Here are the cases versus deaths and hospital beds. I have changed the hospital beds graph so the beds line is green when negative (freeing beds) and red when positive (consuming beds). I really feel sorry for people working in hospitals right now. At least some of the pressure came off for them over the holidays.

  I have covered a lot of anti-vaxxer craziness in this blog, but this takes the cake. An anti-vaxxer who styles himself as the "vaccine police" is advocating drinking urine to prevent COVID-19. This guy Christopher Key, who doesn't look crazy at all, drives around with weapons like a flame thrower and multiple assault rifles, delivering packets of information that he says prove that the vaccines are bioweapons. He was recently arrested for trespassing at an Alabama Whole Foods, where he refused to wear a mask. Because those are bioweapons too? He's now out of jail telling people to drink their own urine to prevent COVID-19, well sort of: The antidote that we have seen now, and we have tons and tons of research, is urine therapy. OK, and I know to a lot of you this sounds crazy, but guys, God’s given us everything we need. ...We've got research after research, documented peer-reviewed research on urine. ...This vaccine is the worst bioweapon I have ever seen. ...

  ASU's COVID-19 Community Response Team  has a new project that could help schools reduce the spread of COVID-19 by filtering the air. It's a timely effort considering that school is restarting just as the Omicron variant is running amok . Now that authorities have finally recognized that COVID-19 spreads mainly through the air, people are looking for ways to remove viral aerosol particles through filtration. If you're a school with plenty of money to spend you can buy some of these . But unless you're in a wealthy school district that is probably not affordable. Enter the Corsi-Rosenthal Cube . It's a DIY air filter built with high-efficiency MERV-13 furnace/AC filters and cardboard, duct-taped together and attached to a box fan. It is said to be just as effective as the high-priced commercial units, but the parts only cost around $100. I spoke with someone who is part of the Community Response Team. Over the last month they did a proof-of-concept with 15 units ...

  Here is the Arizona pandemic numbers summary for the week just ended, and it's not good: Cases are skyrocketing. Excluding last week, the highest one-week increase in new cases per 100K (either Maricopa County or statewide) was 15.9 on August 1. So rates have doubled over the last week (again) and they are over four times as high as the previous highest one-week change since I have been doing this summary.  Worse, according to data from the ASU Biodesign Dashboard  we have exceeded the peak case rate from last year. The 7-day average of new cases was 9,809 on January 12, 2021. Yesterday it was 10,275. To get a sense of how fast cases are spiking, have a look at a plot  of the new cases seven-day average: The only bit of good news here is that the seven day-average of deaths per 100K is not spiking—yet—with fractional increases over the last week.  However, we need to keep in mind that deaths often trail cases and hospitalizations.   New Charts You ca...

  Schools have been under stress due to the pandemic, but now Omicron is making things worse. A lot worse. Here in Arizona, staffing company Educational Services Inc. says they have seen a 10%-20% increase in absences, depending on the district. Phoenix Union district is reporting "between 10% and 15% staff absences and around 15% to 16% student absences." Some substitutes are staying away too, in no small part because of our governor's public illness campaign . One substitute teacher on  reddit  said: I just saw that Peoria Unified was contemplating having kids sick with covid, back at school after 5 days.... Masks are optional. I'm a substitute, and this is why I will not substitute anymore. It's not only happening here. The situation is similar  in Florida , where they are also experiencing a shortage of bus drivers.   My sister, who is a high school teacher in Illinois, tells me that her district is so desperate for substitutes they are trying t...

  You can get COVID-19 and the seasonal flu at the same time. This has been known for some time. In fact, my brother-in-law got the combo back in 2020. But suddenly it's all over the news. Scientific American called it "a great example of how misinformation blooms." They point out that coverage exploded when an Israeli newspaper gave it a catchy name: Flurona.  I don't know, I rather like Fluvid. Though I must admit, Flurona does potentiate low-effort parody covers of My Sharona by The Knack: When you gonna give it to me, give it to me? It is just a matter of time Flurona? Is it just destiny, destiny? Or is it just a game in my mind, Flurona? In any case, the media is, predictably, now freaking out about it. The Daily Beast called it  a "a new nightmare to keep us awake at night." Is it? There is no evidence that it is. Sources I've read say dual infection is possible because both are respiratory diseases and both are transmitted via inhalation of ae...

  I started this blog one year ago today. Well OK, there were a couple posts in December 2020, but that was a false start. Regular daily posts started on January 6, 2021. That's perhaps an inauspicious birthday because it's the same day T**** directed a treasonous mob to stage an insurrection at the Capitol. Anyway, as it says in the "about the blog," I started it because I was kind of obsessing about the  pandemic and reading all I could about it. The blog functioned as an outlet for all the information I was consuming as I was hunkering down at home, and I thought it might be of some modest help to others. One year ago, I never dreamed that I would still be blogging a year later! Like a lot of other people I was kind of naïve, thinking that with the vaccines coming the Apocalypse would be over in a few of months. Just goes to show how wrong a person can be. I've enjoyed writing all of the posts (284 including this one) I've done. This is a kind of writing ac...

  As I noted on Sunda y, Omicron has finally started doing its dirty work in State 48. As of then, case rates had doubled over the week.   Yesterday AzDHS put out a chart that is getting a lot of attention in the media that shows the same thing: Then also yesterday, AzDHS reported 14,192 new cases. Some outlets, like usnews.com couldn't resist sensationalizing it, claiming it was the highest new number of cases in a year. I heard the same claim in a radio report on KJZZ. Well yeah it was, but the number was high because of holiday reporting snafus. The usnews.com story said this, but it was in one sentence in the third paragraph.  More responsible outlets presented the number in context. For example,  azfamily.com  reported the number but immediately and extensively quoted health officials who explained that the number was an anomaly. But even they couldn't resist a headline with that huge number. Everybody knows those daily counts are not reliable.  ...

  Here is the Arizona pandemic numbers summary for the week just ended: I've been wondering for some time now where our Omicron surge was. Well... BAM!    As of Friday ASU's lab was reporting 87% of tests with the s-gene dropout, which indicates Omicron. Both the statewide and Maricopa County case numbers have essentially doubled over the last week.  The new wave is also indicated by the skyrocketing seven-day average of cases: And as I noted on Friday , the case numbers are likely undercounted because people are not reporting results of at-home tests. Experts suggest we need new metrics because of this. Accordingly, I have added new rows to the table to track the change in deaths per 100K for the state and Maricopa County. These data contain some possibly good news.  Both death rates are up a little over the month but down a little over the week. COVID-19 hospital beds are down over both periods.  This is consistent with the growing belief that Omicron is ...

I've been doing this blog for just about a year now. The first regular post was January 6, 2021. I'll reflect on that in a few days. Meanwhile, what kind of a media outlet would this be if I didn't do a year-in-review post? Looking back over the year's posts, it's amazing how much has been going on, and how much there potentially is to review. I can't spend all day on a detailed summary.  So I will try to focus on a bird's eye view. Vaccines & Anti-Vaxxers Vaccines have to be the biggest topic on this blog over the past year. Vaccines were very hard to get this time last year. A lot of people wanted them and the distribution was just getting started.  People had to navigate really crappy systems, like one in Arizona , to make reservations. There were " vaccine tourists " who would travel from other states and even countries in an effort to get jabbed.   Then, around March last year, those who wanted the shots had largely gotten them, and incre...