COVID-19: March 14, 2020
Local impact:
- “Coronavirus test shortages still bedevil Louisiana patients”
- PatIOI’IBrien’sI open
Cases:
- Nationwide: 1629 (CDC numbers from yesterday)
or 2660 (Johns Hopkins University 5:13 pm update) (+632 cases)
or 2443 (NYT Map count updated at 4:48 pm) (+333 cases) - Louisiana: 77 (La. Dept of Health 4:00 pm update) (+41 cases)
1 death (a 58-year-old Orleans Parish resident with underlying health conditions, the governor’s office said) - Orleans Parish: 53 (+27 cases)
- Jefferson Parish: 11
- This is going to last for months. Three months or more.
- Transmits easily through the air. You are infectious before getting sick.
- Incubation period: Four days from exposure to infection
- Cases roughly doubling every four days.
- No vaccine anytime soon.
- We don’t know why children get the virus but mostly don’t get sick.
- We have no idea if it will go away in hotter weather.
Notes from interview with Michael Osterholm, an internationally recognized expert in infectious disease epidemiology on The Joe Rogan Experience
What I can clearly say is that what we do, or don’t do, over the next week will have a massive impact on the local and perhaps national trajectory of coronavirus. We are only about 11 days behind Italy and generally on track to repeat what is unfortunately happening there and throughout much of the rest of Europe very soon.
At this point, containment through contact tracing and increased testing is only part of the necessary strategy. We must move to pandemic mitigation through widespread, uncomfortable, and comprehensive social distancing. That means not only shutting down schools, work (as much as possible), group gatherings, and public events, but also making daily choices to stay away from each other as much as possible to Flatten The Curve below.
- We need to push our local, state, and national leaders to close ALL schools and public spaces and cancel all events and public gatherings now.
- No kid playdates, parties, sleepovers, or families/friends visiting each other’s houses and apartments.
- Take care of yourself and your family, but maintain social distance.
- Reduce the frequency of going to stores, restaurants for the time being.
Nearly 20,000 people are being tested every day for coronavirus in South Korea, more people per capita than anywhere else in the world.
The USA has tested less than 12,000 TOTAL.
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