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Massachusetts sets new record for coronavirus cases in one day
By adamg on Wed, 12/02/2020 - 8:42pm
Massachusetts today reported 4,613 new Covid-19 cases, far higher than any day during the spring surge and close to 1,000 cases higher than the daily record set in mid-November.
The state also reported 1,259 people hospitalized with Covid-19, up from 1,191 on Tuesday and 485 on Nov. 2. It's the seventh straight day the number of hospitalized people has increased. The number remains lower than the rate seen in the spring, however.
The stats also show a non-college testing positivity rate of 6.85%
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October 9
On October 9 there was a UHub post titled “ Number of people hospitalized for Covid-19 in Massachusetts is 47% higher than a month ago”. This was 500 people hospitalized and 734 new cases. This was a marked uptick from summer when 250-300 new cases were the norm.
I commented that it would be a good time to consider rolling back indoor dining allowances, especially since this was 2 weeks after Baker again allowed bar seating and we were turning into the cold season with opportunities becoming increasingly scarce. This would have been a great opportunity to take SOME action reducing capacities and traffic and not just limited to dining.
There was at the time a constituency—which apparently included Governor Baker, Mayor Walsh, and other local mayors—who advocated for a “Relax, bro. Let’s just see how this plays out. Maybe if we do nothing it won’t be so bad?”
4,613 new cases. 1,259 hospitalized. Heckuva job, guys!
We saw this coming 7 weeks ago. No action. WTF!?
[ref: https://www.universalhub.com/2020/number-people-hospitalized-covid-19-ma... ]
Relax, it's nothing
The President plus almost every GOP Senator has had it. They're all elderly and/or sedentary. (Or both, in Trump's case.) And they all recovered quickly! They say you feel kinda sick for a day or two, they pump some drugs in you, and you're suddenly as good as new. Better even. Ready to go out and argue against democratic elections.
I don't believe the above statement (the "it's nothing" part) and I think it should be taken seriously. But the ~33% of Massachusetts residents who voted for Trump are mostly buying into the idea COVID is nothing to worry about. (And plenty of Biden voters too.) They are seeing their friends and not taking precautions. This keeps the spread going strong. Closing restaurants might help but unless they close the highways and actually stop people from visiting friends and and going to work, the trajectory is unlikely to change significantly. Traffic is almost back to Pre-COVID levels. These people aren't headed brunch.
And the death rates have not tracked the number of cases so people who are opposed to COVID restrictions are not being irrational when they doubt their own safety risk. I personally am always correctly wearing a mask and avoiding crowds but I'm also not scared for my life the way I was in April. Many people think the "risk" of not seeing friends and enjoying life outweighs the risk of crowded hospitals.
Yup
And because of this attitude, its going to get worse .
They need to force a shutdown again. Start ticketing people. This how its been doing elsewhere.
I don't feel bad for Baker but I understand. You don't want to shutdown and kill business that is already hurting. Yes argue death vs business aside, it is a political move.
Something that.. once again.. if we had federal leadership and checks coming, forcing a shutdown wouldn't be too hard as the whole "but my business" argument goes away.
But we just have a petulant child in the federal level who's more concerned with grifing and trying to stay in office than he is about doing his job and giving states some direction.
Business part
I have friends (restaurant owners) who have lost everything. Their life's work and most of their life's savings vanish within a few months. They are devastated. They are healthy but no idea where to go from here.
The staff at these places is getting unemployment but some had worked in the restaurant business for decades and it's not clear those jobs will return for a long, long time.
The government screwed up big time but that's old news. People who have comfortable professional jobs where working from home is the only "sacrifice" they need to make have no idea how horrible the Pandemic has been for so much of the population. Obviously, nothing is worse than death but loosing your livelihood and savings is a close second.
You fail to address
the fact that most people choosing to interact with other people are "following the science" and paying attention to data - that shows death rates are extremely low and continuing to decline. For most people the risk is worth the value of some social interaction, that's just the way it is. More stringent regulations will not be helpful at this point.
Elderly, sedentary - and access to the best healthcare
It's worth pointing out, when we say "well, Trump, etc survived it", that the President and GOP Senators all got top-tier, publicly funded, healthcare. Most people don't have access to the kind of treatments they received, or if they did, they'd be bankrupted by the costs. This isn't something where you can lay in bed with some chicken soup for a day or two and then you're back up and running.
So in other words:
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I’m not impressed with this approach. It feels like our leaders are just trying to run out the clock because they don’t want to make the tough decisions required of their offices.
Bonkers
BPS kids have been out of school since March. Our children suffer while restaurants, casinos and spas are open for business, causing spikes. School closure isn’t backed by science. Closure of indoor dining is. How is Boston’s backwards, ineffective approach still In effect?
The selfishness rages on...
I'm finding the quarantine recommendation for incoming travelers, is followed & enforced as well as the relatively new hands-free driving law. You know you should do it, but a noticeable group of folks have a mindset of, "Well, I'm different/more informed/aware of the risk/etc., so I can proceed as usual."
There's no societal collaboration on any given effort, whether nationally or state-wide, because of so many seemingly having been brought up to question everything, including concepts with statistical evidence. How we've gotten to a point where the acknowledgement of what a "fact" is, becomes disputed at any given moment, I can't comprehend.
A unified effort is needed, to ensure more businesses don't suffer further, while allowing people to earn a living safely...all while following basic CDC guidelines, no matter what age/health status/responsibilities you are, or fall under. The "but me" crap is what has majorly contributed toward the continued economic & health struggles, which may have become more abbreviated, if not for the multitude of conspiracy theorists trying to prove their selfish self-worth by raging against the machine.
Death rate isn't the only measurable data point that should be looked at. Some relatively healthy people who have had a bout with COVID-19, now have ongoing health issues which need to be addressed (and I know one of them). Let's talk about that data. How do you justify an abrupt long-term change to someone's health, because of this? Not with, "well, at least you didn't die".
Happy Thanksgiving, everyone.
Enjoy seeing all the relatives? Even the ones from North Dakota?
It was a throwback Thankstaking
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Native_American_disease_and_epidemics
Death rate is a crappy metric
I wish people would quit using death rate as a metric of severity. Polio didnt have a super high death rate, but you don’t hear anyone claiming that polio was no big deal. There is increasing evidence of COVID-19 ruining people’s health, possibly permanently.
Evidence, not exactly increasing
The speculation about "long Covid" and other long-term effects has been going on since the beginning, but we're starting to see some better studies as time goes on.
One thing to note is that many of the side effects noted in Covid patients are not "novel" in the sense that influenza and other more familiar diseases can do the same thing. Much like brain-eating amoeba and necrotizing fasciitis, the question isn't whether awful things ever occur, but how often they do.
One big area of speculation has been around myocarditis, which is anecdotally reported on a lot. This paper looked at 277 autopsies of people who died of Covid and found it was relatively rare, and in general you would expect the most severe side-effects in people with severe disease courses.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1054880720301046
Much like fears of reinfection and short-lived or non-existent immunity, I think concerns about long-term damage are reasonable, but likely grossly overestimated. Back in March we thought this could have a 2-5% fatality rate, but today the data clearly suggests that number is off by a factor of 10-100x unless you're over 80. I strongly expect we'll see the same pattern with sequelae as data improves. SARS-COV-2 is a new bug but it's not from Mars and it fits the patterns of many other viral illnesses.