COVID-19 Update for June 23, 2020
Most Americans worry about coronavirus now - even in states of denial
Nearly 3 out of 4 Americans say that resuming “normal” activity would be a big risk, according to a survey by Axios, 71% say the economy may be reopening too soon, and 85% fear a second wave of COVID-19. These represent big jumps from two weeks ago and include “red states” where COVID-19 denial has been widespread.
Useful: A team of researchers has compiled a database of so-called “superspreader” events where multiple people get infected with COVID-19. The file includes more than 800 such events in the United States. While many were in prisons or nursing homes, some were religious or social gatherings.
Second-thoughts on reopenings: In Maine, officials have decided to delay reopening bars, and Louisiana is continuing restrictions on how many people can gather after reporting more than 1,000 new COVID-19 cases for the first time since early April. Half the nation has COVID-19 cases increasing. Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards says the spike seen in his state is coming almost entirely from community spread, not nursing homes or other “congregate” locations. In other words: the absence of social distancing is the main factor.
The welcome mat is not out: The New York Times reports that the European Union is considering putting travelers from the United States into the same category as Russia and Brazil — three countries with uncontrolled COVID-19. The draft list of countries excluded from EU arrivals as of July 1 is based on the average number of new infections per 100,000 people. In the EU, the average is 16, while the United States currently has an average of 107 new cases per 100,000 per day, according to the Times.
Politics:
No joke: While White House officials insisted that President Trump was “joking” when he said Saturday that he told staff to “slow down testing” so that the U.S. COVID-19 numbers would stay low, the president himself said Tuesday that he was serious — and repeated the point. Minutes later, his top health officials denied getting such an order and said more testing was needed — and being done.
No joke #2: Politico reports that the White House is considering a housecleaning at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention “positioning the agency as a coronavirus scapegoat as cases surge in many states and the U.S. falls behind other nations that are taming the pandemic.”
The numbers wizards at FiveThirtyEight.com have a report on how the withdrawn studies on hydroxychloroquine might have been detected sooner.
Certain political partisans continue to insist that the rate of new hospitalizations, deaths or new confirmed cases is nothing to worry about.
The federal Medicare administrator told Breitbart News, a Republican-leaning political news site, that New York and other Democrat-controlled states did not follow federal guidelines on protecting nursing home residents from COVID-19.