Category: Covid-19

1. Most important is to be caring for the dying, sick, hungry, unemployed, lonely, fearful, and children.
2. And also provide or curate programming online including worship services. And eventually provide safe physically-distanced options.

@mentionsThe above is my general advice. Now I also see your whole thread. Yes, care for the *outsider* is crucial. Yes, also we take care not to spread the virus in nursing homes or prisons; nor by gathering groups of vulnerable without masks and have them sing, which is a big spreader.

@mentionsI would also add that Christians should be advocating for the poor @RevDrBarber the prisoner @ScottHech for nursing homes @maddow the refugee @roamingwab and for aid for the developing world @matthew_loftus @bertrand_blair and Puerto Rico @CarlosHappyNPO

@mentionsSee also:

Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington has a model.

It assumes stay-at-home orders in every state in the next week.

You can look up each state:

Summary:

This model predicts the maximum deaths per day.
Florida: 136 on May 3.
Minnesota: 49 on Apr 19.
South Carolina: 30 on Apr 26.
We'll see.

Context:

I agree with this Carl T. Bergstrom thread that the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at University of Washington model is too optimistic. It assumes social distancing is practiced and it is flawed by being based on fatalities so far.

The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at University of Washington people are trying to get Florida's governor to order social distancing.

I have not seen any expert who thinks the IHME projection modeling is excellent. It is based on reported covid deaths and it is regularly redone to fit curves in other countries. It was just invented in March to help the state of WA. It is an estimate based on Wuhan and Italy.

But there is no other public updated national model. So, it is useful to give the public some idea since tens of thousands is hard to picture. But it fluctuates based on reported deaths. It does not take into account poor testing.
See threads below to learn more.

Huge: It only models the first wave and assumes only 3% will be infected. "Our model says that social distancing will likely lead to the end of the first wave of the epidemic by early June … an estimated 97% of the population will still be susceptible."

We see evidence that in hard-hit areas, 14% are affected in the first wave.

The point is that a huge number of people (97-86% of people) are still vulnerable to outbreaks after the first wave is slowed due to lock-downs.

Also the second wave begins not long after the first wave are supposedly stopped.

Other models:

GLEAM national model: gleamproject.org/covid-19#model April 11 peak time for deaths in the US.

LANL state model: covid-19.bsvgateway.org Cases will peak mid-April to mid-May.

CU Epi county medical capacity: columbia.maps.arcgis.com/apps/webappvie…

Specht is doing a lot of calculations here but I think it is a useful estimate, which fits with other guesses, that hospitals will become overwhelmed around May 8th. That helps me to think about whether to cancel non-essential travel and conferences in the next couple of months.

Descriptions of the situation:

and

It is doubling approximately every 4-10 days.

Doubling time every 7-10 days.

"We can expect that we’ll continue to see a doubling of cases every 6 days."

"doubled every 4 days."

New York Times today: "Over the weekend, more than 230 cases were added, and on Monday, the national total approached 600."

Princeton:

Stanford:

Harvard:

Spread to new states on Friday:

Yes, the contagiousness and lethality are scary:

But my Facebook feed has people saying not to panic by buying too much stuff.

I don't think that takes away from the need to cancel non-essential travel and gatherings. 

If Specht is right that there will be 4 million cases around May 11,

and the overall case-fatality rate (CFR) continues to be 2.3% (

), that would be mean 92,000 of that 4 million would die. 

"the estimated mean R0 ["basic reproduction number," or R0 (pronounced R-nought)] for COVID-19 is around 3.28, with a median of 2.79 and IQR of 1.16."

Influenza is about 1.53.

or 1.71

Here is someone who is skeptical about the continued exponential growth of the disease.

https://twitter.com/drg1985/status/1236653062225367041

In other words, once lots of people get the disease, people will change their behavior and reduce the rate of transmission. 

Indeed, it will not spread as quickly if people practice "social distancing."
"the aim of public-health policy, whether at the city, national or global scale, is to flatten the curve, spreading the infections out over time."

https://twitter.com/mims/status/1237084608635830277?s=19

What happens when the hospital is overwhelmed:

And another description of what it is like to have hospitals overwhelmed with COVID-19:

Harvard expert: If a city in the US had a similar spread as Wuhan, it would overtake the amount of ICU beds in 45-60 days from the first case. But strict social distancing in Guangzho slowed the spread so it peaked at 19 days.

CNN poll yesterday: "57%, say they are very (18%) or somewhat (39%) confident that the government can prevent a nationwide epidemic of the virus."

South Korea and China have:

But Americans are less likely to do social distancing.