Covid by Dave

Montana had a huge spike in October and November, but has improved dramatically and are now back to early October case numbers. Hospitalizations and deaths have been very high recently but dropping a bit.

Missouri had a big spike around the middle of November, but have gotten their case numbers back to pre-spike levels. Those cases caused a big spike in deaths but those dropped back down this week as well.

Mississippi has a bit of an unusual situation. They have had a big spike in cases and deaths, but their hospitalization numbers have declined significantly. Very strange.

Mass Covid 19 update. This is now the two hundred and fiftieth day that I have been posting these updates. Never knew when I started that it would last this long and get so intense late in the game. Particularly brutal day for deaths. Cases soared, to 6,135, which looks like it's our highest number of cases in a day ever. They did 86,050 tests, so the Positive Test Rate ticked down to 7.1%, but as you can see when the do a lot of tests and the rate's so high we get a fuckload of cases. Deaths skyrocketed, to one hundred and eighteen. Ouch. Total Confirmed Cases: 346,930 Total Confirmed Deaths: 12,118 Two people actually got out of the hospital today, which is a nice break from previous trends. Two more went into the ICU. That brings those numbers to 2,257 and 433, respectively.

Minnesota is another place where the lag between cases and deaths is very apparent. They had a huge spike back in late November and early December, but they've turned things completely around and case levels are back to pre-spike levels. Hospitalizations have also steadily declined following the case numbers. Not so much for deaths though. They only started dropping this past week.

Michigan is the classic example of deaths following increased cases. They had a huge spike between the middle of November and the middle of December. The last three weeks their cases have fallen off significantly, to a third of peak levels, but deaths have stayed very high and only started dropping this past week.

Mass Covid 19 update. We hit 12,000 deaths today. A moment of silence for all those we have lost. Cases dipped down, to 3,659, and they did 49,229 tests, so the Positive Test Rate dropped a slight bit to 7.4%, which is still way too high. Deaths ticked up, to fifty eight. Total Confirmed Cases: 340,795 Total Confirmed Deaths: 12,000 Twenty nine more people went into the hospital today and one more went into the ICU. We've been averaging under 3,500 cases a day the last five days, so that's a good thing. Hopefully will become a trend. The nine days before that we had been averaging over 4,600.

Massachusetts has recently experienced a huge surge in Covid cases, completely reversing earlier gains in suppressing the virus. The only blessing is that it appears to be VASTLY less deadly than it used to be. The most recent surge in cases can be traced back to November 6th. That was the first day since way back in the beginning that we hit 2,000 cases in a day. Since then we've had 195,000 cases. By November 6th we had only had 162,500 cases at that point. If you figure that everyone who's going to die of Covid that got it by November 6th would die by December 6th, that puts us at a total of 10,805 deaths. That many deaths divided by 162,500 cases gives you a mortality rate of 6.6%. Since then 1,020 deaths divided by 195,000 cases gives you a mortality rate of one half of one percent. That's THIRTEEN TIMES less likely a chance to die if you catch Covid now compared to if you caught it before November 6th. Now the mortality rate has been declining for a while so this did

Maryland's fortunes have taken a turn for the worse lately. They had been doing pretty well up until the beginning of November, but they cases started taking off and they went from averaging 4,100 cases a week to 16,900. Hospitalizations have risen from 340 a week to 1,260. Deaths have risen even more, going from about 50 per week to now 290. That's a 4x, 4x and 6x increase in each category.

Maine was doing just fine right up until the beginning of November. Then things started going very badly. They were averaging 190 cases a week. Last week they hit 3,000. They were averaging fewer than eight hospitalizations a week. The past four weeks they've averaged 83. They had been averaging about two deaths a week. The last four weeks have all been over 30. Percentage wise, that's a huge jump in every category. 16x for cases. 10x for hospitalizations. 16x for deaths. That is not good.

Louisiana was doing ok until the middle of November, then cases started spiking and deaths followed. Last week cases were a bit down so hopefully that will continue.

Mass Covid 19 update. Pretty grim news today. Cases came in at 4,060, but they only did 49,772 tests, so the Positive Test Rate soared to 8.2%. Deaths dropped down, thankfully, to forty eight. Total Confirmed Cases: 337,136 Total Confirmed Deaths: 11,942 Another seventy four people went into the hospital today, and fourteen more went into the ICU, so it was a bad day in the hospitals. Do not like the high Positive Test Rate. Hopes that comes back down soon or else we'll be getting 8,000 cases the next time they do 100,000 tests, which they did three days ago.

Mass Covid 19 update. Brutal day for deaths, but the cases dropped. There were 2,156 cases, which is partially because of the fact that they didn't do that many tests, 41,331 to be exact, but the Positive Test Rate dropped down to 5.2%. Deaths soared, to one hundred. Ouch. Total Confirmed Cases: 333,076 Total Confirmed Deaths: 11,894 Seventy nine more people went into the hospital today, but there was no change in the ICU number. That means those numbers are now 2,156 and 416, respectively.

Kentucky was doing ok until November, then cases started rising until they peaked four weeks ago. They have come down since then, which is good. Hospitalizations are up with a huge spike last week. Deaths are up too, to four times the level of October.

Mass Covid 19 update. This is for two days so it's a little screwy, but I'll give the straight numbers plus the daily numbers divided by two. Cases came in at 7,424, which is 3712 a day, which is not so bad. Deaths came in at 46, which is 23 a day, also not too bad compared to what we have been getting. Total Confirmed Cases: 330,920 Total Confirmed Deaths: 11,794 Twenty three people actually got out of the hospital today, which is very good. Seven more went into the ICU. That brings those numbers to 2,077 and 416, respectively.

Kansas was doing pretty well until the beginning of November. Then cases started rising steadily and are now at triple previous rates. Hospitalizations have doubled in that time period, and deaths have essentially tripled as well.

Iowa had a huge spike in cases in November, but have since then dropped back to previous case levels. Deaths keep rising though, with a huge spike just two weeks ago.

Indiana was doing pretty well up until the beginning of October. They had been averaging about 6,300 cases a week. The past six weeks, they've averaged almost 42,000 cases a week. Their hospitalizations were averaging about 450 a week. The past seven weeks they've averaged 2,300 a week. Deaths had been averaging about 80 a week. The past three weeks they've averaged 565 a week. Things seem to be easing off slightly, but we'll have to watch closely.

Illinois had a gigantic spike in cases around the end of November, but have gotten that back down substantially. Deaths have soared recently too and haven't dropped off as much as cases.

Mass Covid 19 update. Notice. No covid report tomorrow (Christmas) or New Year's Day due to a lack of state reporting. The grimness just keeps coming. Cases rose substantially, to 5,655. They did quite a few tests, 114,476 to be exact, so the Positive Test Rate came in at 4.9%. Deaths stayed high, at seventy six. Total Confirmed Cases: 323,496 Total Confirmed Deaths: 11,748 Twenty nine more people went into the hospital today, and there was no change in the ICU population. That makes those numbers come in at 2,095 and 409, respectively.

Mass Covid 19 update. Pretty grim today. Lots of deaths. Cases ticked up, to 4,509, but they did 97,655 tests, so the Positive Test Rate dropped down to 4.6%. Deaths rocketed up, to eighty one. Total Confirmed Cases: 317,841 Total Confirmed Deaths: 11,672 Sixty two people went into the hospital today, and three got out of the ICU. That brings those numbers to 2,066 and 409, respectively.

Idaho's problems started in the beginning of October. Before then, they had gotten cases down to below 2,000 a week. Now they're up over 10,000 a week. Hospitalizations have gone from a hundred a week to almost four hundred. Deaths have jumped from about twenty a week to over a hundred. Hit 140 last week.

I was doing an analysis of hospitalizations in Massachusetts compared to the number of infections over time. So far, in Massachusetts, a total of 15,372 people have been hospitalized with Covid since the beginning of the pandemic. We've had 331,000 cases so far. That's a hospitalization rate of 4.6%, calculated over the full length of the pandemic. If you break up the time though, the numbers are dramatically different comparing early on to now. On June 2 we hit 10,000 hospitalized. At that point we had 97,539 cases. So we got 10,000 hospitalizations out of the first 100,000 cases and then 5,372 out of the next 230,000 cases. Given this, the hospitalization rate went from 10% to 2.3%. Therefore, if you get covid NOW in Massachusetts your chances of going to the hospital have dropped over 75% compared to the beginning of the pandemic. This is good.

Hawaii had a big spike in August, but since then has gotten things much more under control. Case and deaths have stabilized, but hospitalizations had a huge spike just this week.

If you want to keep track of the national vaccination effort, this is a good resource. Massachusetts has administered 20,577 doses so far according to this. https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/covid-vaccine-tracker-global-distribution/?fbclid=IwAR3rb0_f7NnXHJsN72tzUizwSKYZKaCY8MHnXkY1_GfS25xCfOmFv4HGiTs

Mass Covid 19 update. Relatively good news, for a change. Cases dropped down, to 3,293, which is the lowest number of cases we've had in three weeks. They did 62,078 tests, which resulted in the Positive Test Rate dropping down to 5.3%. Deaths ticked up slightly, to forty three. Total Confirmed Cases: 313,332 Total Confirmed Deaths: 11,591 Thirteen more people went into the hospital today and two more went into the ICU. That brings those numbers up to 2,004 and 412. More than 2,000 people in the hospital is not good.

Georgia had been doing pretty well until the end of November, then cases started rising sharply, and are now double what they were five weeks ago. Hospitalizations have doubled too, but deaths are staying relatively flat.

Florida had largely recovered from it's huge summer spike, but starting in October cases started rising again, and now they're at four times the previous levels. Hospitalizations have only increased modestly but if the case rate keeps up like this then that will change. Deaths have pretty much doubled from November levels.

Delaware was doing pretty well right up until the middle of October, then cases started rising sharply and the past three weeks they've averaged five times higher than the October levels. Deaths pretty much doubled starting in mid-October and then had a super huge spike just this week.

Mass Covid 19 update. Cases dropped down, but otherwise it's pretty crappy news today. Cases dropped, to 3,760, but they only did 61,067 tests, which is a normal number for a Sunday, so that made the Positive Test Rate jump all the way up to 6.2%. Deaths dropped down, thankfully, to forty one. Total Confirmed Cases: 310,039 Total Confirmed Deaths: 11,548 Bad day in the hospitals. Seventy two more people went into the hospital and twenty three more people went into the ICU. That brings those numbers up to 1,991 and 410, respectively.