COVID-19 Update, Tuesday, October 20th

Treatments, human challenge studies, and hospitalizations.

I know I am doing M,W,F updates now but I had a couple of items to share and a few minutes to type it up so here goes.

1. I am attaching a little chart of the current medications being used as treatments. I don't normally cover treatments but I got a few questions regarding them and I wanted to provide a quick snapshot of where we are. This chart was created by one of my students so it may be imperfect, and of course, the information is ever-changing but it is a quick look at where we are right now along with links to source content.

treatments.docx

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2. The UK has decided to do "human challenge" studies. This means they will deliberately give someone COVID to determine if their vaccines work. This is big news because this is not how human trials work and it is very controversial. Typically, in human trials, you give someone the vaccine and then just wait and see if, during normal life, they get the virus or not, we do not intentionally give people potentially deadly viruses. So this is a new approach. In related news, we still don't have details on why J&J had to pause their trials. The lack of transparency has some experts worried. You may recall that J&J is using a live attenuated vaccine that requires only a single dose.

3. While numbers are up, currently, daily deaths are down which is great. But hospitalizations are up with 14 states reporting that in the last week their hospitalizations have peaked. Keep the work "peaked" in perspective, while we are seeing increases in hospitalization rates (which is not good), the word "peaked" can create some confusion - in areas where hospitalizations were low before, a peak doesn't necessarily mean they are at capacity, it just means they are seeing their highest levels to date. If NYC said they were seeing a peak we would need to be very concerned, but in areas where hospitalizations were previously low or non-existent, a peak is not as concerning.

Also, the increase in the midwest is somewhat expected - things tend to start on the coasts and slowly make their way in-land. So I would expect to see things increase in the midwest after the coasts. That said, some areas are hitting high enough numbers that they are now concerned they may indeed hit capacity if they continue on this trajectory, such as New Mexico that is reporting a 101% increase in hospitalizations over the last week. So while you don't want the language to alarm you, you do want to have the facts. We also know that flu season is upon us and that will add additional strain on the medical system along with creating confusion about which virus a person has so we do need to be diligent in our risk reduction strategies. (handwashing, distancing when in public, and mask-wearing). We also just need to anticipate that the next couple of months will probably be a bit bumpy.

FINAL THOUGHTS: yesterday we had a 10% chance of snow. Statistics were in our favor. But it did snow - for hours. You see, statistics, while extremely helpful, can't paint the full picture. Sometimes the chance of something happening is slim but it happens. Sometimes you do all the right things and it doesn't work out. Sometimes you mask, distance, isolate, hand-wash etc. and you still get sick and some people take no precautions, ignore it all and manage to escape unscathed. There is no reasoning it. Do what you can to keep yourself and others safe but don't beat yourself up if you end up sick.