COVID-19 Friday July 10th

I got kind of lengthy today so sorry about that. Friday means numbers, increasing numbers, deaths, childhood vaccines and recovery time.

1. Global Numbers increased by 1.39 million over the last week with 33k new deaths. While the case increase is faster than we would like, the case fatality is down again. Case fatality rate (CFR) went from 4.76% to 4.49% over the last week. This means that less people are dying from it. Australia saw a significant spike in cases, and New Zealand continues to see cases trickle in. I included a chart of Australia so you can see what a second wave looks like. While some areas in the US are experiencing a second wave, the US as a whole is still on the first (see charts for comparison).

2. The US added 391k new cases over the last week. This is nearly double the weekly cases we were seeing a month ago. For perspective on our pacing, in the US from 0 cases - 1 million took 99 days, 1 million to 2 took 43 days, 2 million to 3 took 28 days. We have essentially cut our pacing in 1/2 (estimated of course). To be fair, from 0-1 million was highly impacted by testing. In accordance with the global trend, we also saw our case fatality rate drop from 4.53 to 4.22. The US is doing better than the global average at keeping people alive. Georgia, Florida and Texas saw significant increases in cases over the last week. Arizona and Texas also saw a notable rise in deaths, although their total case fatality rates are still holding steady. Take a look at the attached charts, daily cases for the US directly maps to Memorial day and states reopening.

3. I've again been hearing the grumble that everything is being coded as a COVID death so I wanted to share the numbers for that too. I pulled these fresh this morning, of all the deaths happening in the United States right now, only 5.9% are being attributed to what is called PIC (pneumonia, influenza or covid)(down from 9%). That number has been getting smaller each week for 10 consecutive weeks based on official death certificate information. Now do keep in mind that the official death certificate info is delayed by about a month due to the process and those numbers are subject to change as more death certificates arrive. COVID is making up the majority of excess deaths - meaning the number of deaths we are seeing above what is normal but only 5.9% of total deaths. So the claims that everything is being listed as a COVID death does not have merit.

4. The % positives is increasing. So one of the ways we monitor the testing increase compared to the actual case increase is by the % positive. We are seeing increases in the % positives in most parts of the country. How much of an increase depends on where you live but south central is seeing the highest increase with double digits (15-26%). The national average is 8.7%.

5. Childhood vaccination rates are down as high as 63% in some areas since the pandemic began. I want to caution against skipping vaccines right now out of fear of getting the virus from going to the doctor. Remember that some research indicates vaccines may be a big part of why children aren't as likely to get sick. While we don't know that definitively, there is solid evidence to suggest it. 6. A research letter posted in JAMA yesterday took a look at persistent symptoms of people who had recovered from COVID. Everyone in the study had been hospitalized. Only 149 people were in the study so we need to take that into consideration but the findings are in alignment with prior studies we have looked at. What they found is that symptoms of the disease seem to linger even after a person has recovered (at least in cases serious enough to require medical intervention). 60 days after they first became sick, only 12% (rounded) of them were free of symptoms. 44% (rounded) reported worsened quality of life. 87% (rounded) reported that they were still experiencing at least one symptom.

*There is lots happening and making the headlines as schools around the country consider what the fall will look like and how to return to the classroom. We will tackle that news next week.

FINAL THOUGHTS: It's Friday which means we survived another week! It also means it is time to make a plan for your mental health recovery. I encourage you to step away from all the news and just enjoy your life and the people in it. If dragons attack, someone will text you. ;) Side note: I have also been getting asked who I am so I just wanted to say a quick word about that. I am no one. Not really. But I do have my PhD in public health and epidemiology. I am a college professor and teach/train future public health professionals and epidemiologists and am proud to say I have former students working all over the world including at the WHO and CDC and in medical facilities all over the world including places like the Mayo Clinic (super proud of my students). I am actively working with this pandemic both in the US and overseas, by helping communities respond to it and determine what steps they need to take to keep their communities safe, and how to safely open their schools and businesses as well as by training contact tracers (4k and counting to date). In order to do that, I have to stay current on the research and crunch the numbers. I began posting these updates to help my family and friends understand the outbreak and have information they could trust. So, I am not anyone fancy, I am tired and frustrated just like you. But I am an epidemiologist working the most significant pandemic of our lifetime and I am happy to share that with anyone who cares to join me.