20191223M Day -8: Lady Bird Lake Reflections from Austin, Texas

Lady Bird Lake – Austin, TX – Dec 23, 2019 (Credit: SurfingTheUniverse.com)

20200515F Santa Cruz, CA: Back in December, I was in Austin. My beloved flew in for the holidays. We walked along Lady Bird Lake during the day. It was a beautiful sunny day.

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Lady Bird Lake – Austin, TX – Dec 23, 2019 (Credit: SurfingTheUniverse.com)

Meanwhile, the press was reporting on how this flu season was turning out different than past flu seasons. I’m not sure who decided that the unusual flu season would be the focus of the news and medical press on this day. Here is an article that caught my eye:

Rare B Flu Strain Causing Early Surge This Season from passporthealthusa.com

Here are some quotes of interest:

Dave Osthus is a statistician and flu forecaster at Los Alamos National Laboratory. Osthus explained that the current “2019/20 season is already worse than three of the past 20 flu seasons ever were, and the worst part of the flu season—historically late December through early March—hasn’t happened yet.”

especially this one ending with “worst than imagined”:

Looking at the influenza trends, the CDC was able to publicize that the flu season has “about a 40% chance of a peak in late December, a 30% chance of a peak in January, and a 25% chance of a peak in February.” These numbers may change as the season continues, but the outcome will remain the same or even become worse than imagined.

Looking back in time, it was reported in May that the 2018-2019 flu season was also “unusual”:

The just-ended 2018-2019 flu season was relatively mild compared to the last season, during which nearly 80,000 people in the U.S. died of flu-related illness.

The 2018-2019 season has been unusual, though, because the flu came in two waves: one that peaked at the end of December, and a second that peaked in early March.

It seems that “unusual” flu seasons will be the usual for the foreseeable future.

 

20200507h Day 128: About 8 day average confirmed COVID-19 case doubling time since first case Nov 17, 2019

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Data for May 6, 2020, from https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

As of yesterday, total worldwide confirmed cases of COVID-19 are calculated to be 3,913,643 by worldometers.info and increasing at about 100K new cases per day. By this weekend, the total cases should cross 2^22 = 4,194,304.

In 20200417F Day 108: Surfing the Multiverse back through a Pandemic Wormhole and 20200321S Day 81: Three to the Fourth Power is Eighty-One, I documented the exponential growth of worldwide COVID-19 cases. I assumed an initial outbreak date of Dec 12, 2019. This led to the following:

  • 2 weeks to go from 1 to 10 cases by Dec 26, 2019
  • 2 weeks to go from 10 to 100 cases by Jan 9, 2020
  • 2 weeks to go from 100 to 1000 cases by Jan 23, 2020
  • 1 week to go from 1000 to 10000 cases by Jan 30, 2020
  • 5 weeks to go from 10K to 100K cases by Mar 5, 2020
  • 2 weeks to go from 100K to 250K cases by Mar 19, 2020
  • 2 weeks to go from 250K to 1M cases by Apr 2, 2020
  • 2.5 weeks to go from 1M to 2.5M cases by Apr 19, 2020
  • 2.5 weeks to go from 2.5M to 4M cases by May 7, 2020

It’s been a total of 21 weeks since Dec 12, 2019. There are reports that the initial outbreak case may have happened earlier than Dec 12. Today, I tweeted an answer to a question from @DanielleFong in which I researched the first case to be Nov 17.  That would be 128+45=173 days ago, or almost 25 weeks ago. While confirmed cases were definitely at least doubling every week in the beginning of the pandemic, the recent doubling rate is about half the initial rate. By this weekend, the first case will be 176 days ago and the number of doublings will be 22. 176/22 gives exactly 8 days doubling time.

If it was even doubling every 8 days, we would have gotten to 4,194,304 cases from Nov 17th, 2019 like this:

  • 2019-11-17u: 1 case
  • 2019-11-25M: 2 cases
  • 2019-12-03T: 4 cases
  • 2019-12-11W: 8 cases
  • 2019-12-19h: 16 cases
  • 2019-12-27F: 32 cases
  • 2020-01-04S: 64 cases
  • 2020-01-12u: 128 cases
  • 2020-01-20M: 256 cases
  • 2020-01-28T: 512 cases
  • 2020-02-05W: 1024 cases
  • 2020-02-13h: 2048 cases
  • 2020-02-21F: 4096 cases
  • 2020-02-29S: 8192 cases
  • 2020-03-08u: 16384 cases
  • 2020-03-16M: 32768 cases
  • 2020-03-24T: 65536 cases
  • 2020-04-01W: 131072 cases
  • 2020-04-09h: 262144 cases
  • 2020-04-17F: 524288 cases
  • 2020-04-25S: 1048576 cases
  • 2020-05-03u: 2097152 cases
  • 2020-05-11M: 4194304 cases

For posterity, Danielle’s question …

 

20200413M Day 104: Dr. Robin Armstrong, M.D. in Texas, Interview with Joe Piscopo about COVID-19 Treatment at Nursing Home

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Dr. Robin Armstrong, medical director of The Resort at Texas City nursing home. April 7, 2020. (AP Photo/David J. Phillip)

SANTA CRUZ, California – I have been interested in treatments for COVID-19 since my brother sent me a treatment involving hydroxychloroquine, zinc, and azithromycin. When I heard that a doctor in Texas, near my hometown, was treating patients at a nursing home, which was on Logan Street, I had to learn more. Here are the notes I took from an interview that Dr. Robin Armstrong had with Joe Piscopo on April 13.

JP: Are older folks affected most?

RA: Yes, they are more predisposed to COVID-19, just as with other similar illnesses.

JP: Does this virus keep circulating in a closed area?

RA: Yes, this virus is transmitted very easily with RO of 2-3. It can live on surfaces up to 48 hours. That’s why this virus is different. It’s also different because people shed the virus while they are asymptomatic.

Susan, 68yo: If symptomatic, do I ask for a drug from the beginning, or wait until breathing problems occur.

RA: We really don’t know. In our nursing home, we wait until someone becomes symptomatic. The majority of people have mild symptoms and get over this. In India, they are taking it prophylactically now. I’m not recommending that yet here.

JP: Hydroxychloroquine usage in India?  The deaths there are much less.

RA: A friend of mine in India says people there are taking hydroxychloroquine prophylactically. Patients having mild symptoms are improving. Our study is suggestive that it works as well. Hydroxychloroquine and Azithromycin together are effective at moderating mild symptoms.

JP: What about platelets?

RA: You can harvest blood plasma with anti-covid-19 antibodies and some people have had success with that. This is for very ill hospital patients. My goal is to keep people out of the hospital.

JP: [Asked about politics]

RA: I’m on the Republican national committee now and that’s why some in the mainstream media has been attacking me regarding this treatment.

JP: What is the agenda of the mainstream media in attacking this?

RA: Their entire focus is on defeating Trump and anything that brings him down, that’s what they are aiming for. I treated my patients based on the studies out of China and France – not because Trump suggested it.

RA: We have an ample supply of it – Bayer is the maker of it – it shows promise and we should be prescribing it for people.

JP: Texas will open soon I hear?

RA: I’m sure hoping so. Texas has not been as hard hit as New York City. We are more spread out and rural, so it’s harder for the virus to jump from person to person. We need to listen to the scientists and do it in a wise manner.

 

 

20200329 Day 89: Back to the Future

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Classic car parked near West Cliff, Santa Cruz, CA

Santa Cruz, CA: I took a stroll along the beach on West Cliff. This weekend, the parking lots began being closed off to discourage people from gathering on the beaches and trails. There were many people still walking along the beach and in the neighborhoods nearby. I saw a classic car parked in one of the neighborhoods.

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Parking along West Cliff is now closed in Santa Cruz, CA

Today it was also announced that the “15 days to flatten the curve” plan of social distancing guidelines has been extended to 45 days. New York still has the most new total and new deaths due to COVID-19 at 965 and 82, respectively. New Jersey, Michigan, Illinois, Louisiana, California, and Washington all had reported 10-21 daily deaths yesterday. The statistics from worldometers.info also show the US with a total of 142,224 cases, 2,485 deaths, and 4,559 recovered. Both Pres. Trump and Dr. Fauci are in sync with preparing the country for 100,000 or more deaths due to COVID-19.

I’m still hoping to intercept a future – to head in a way back to the future of a parallel time line that I was in before I started daily (more or less) blogging 89 days ago. I’ve somewhat arbitrarily selected June 8, 2020, as the date I wish to intercept. Or, perhaps, I’ve sent myself a message from the future that caused me to pick that date for some reason.

 

 

20200327F Day 87: Unemployment, Stock Market, and COVID-19 Cases are All Up

This week a record 3.28 million Americans applied for unemployment benefits. Yesterday, the Dow had it’s best 3-day gain since 1931 and today it finished the week up 12.8%, it’s best weekly advance since 1938. The S&P 500 rose 10.3% – best week since 2008. The Nasdaq rose 9.1% – best week since 2009. U.S. COVID-19 cases topped 100,000.  U.S. Influenza A cases topped 128,000 and Influenza B cases topped 113,000. Also, the largest relief package ever, at $2 trillion for coronavirus relief, was signed into law.