On the pre-corona trajectory, this was not supposed to happen for about 11 years!
Category: Knowledge and News
We recently saw a Scottish document dated in the 16th century which claimed to be the oldest extant reference to the f-word, but this predates that by nearly 300 years. It is a reference in a court document circa 1310 which mentions Roger the Navel-Fucker, or at least that is the opinion of one historian.
The document still exists!
The Chinese can now call it 的美國病毒 (the American virus).
They attribute it to one lone American cyclist.
Of course, we have plenty of equally nutty theories in the States, but …
“What is unique to China is the inability for most citizens in the country to fact-check the claims being made by official CCP outlets, or to seek any independent information outside China’s Great Firewall.”
Seems like a nice fellow. How did Trump miss him for a cabinet position?
“Joe was only convicted of a fraction of the crimes he committed while operating the zoo”
Am I the only person in the English-speaking world who has not watched Tiger King? Based on the internet chatter, this thing must have higher ratings than the moon landing.
You may have noticed that some analysts have been measuring improvement in the coronavirus statistics by saying that the percentage increase is going down, as measured by new deaths divided by the previous death total. I really shouldn’t have to explain this to anyone who has taken 7th grade arithmetic, but that is mathematical gibberish. Any situation that is stable will appear to decline by using this method, and many situations which are getting worse will appear to get better.
Example One: a stable situation. Let’s imagine a country where exactly one person dies every day for a 30-day month. On day 2, the increase in deaths will be 100%, Day 3 will be 50%, etc. By the time day 1 of the next month arrives, President Salamander can announce, “Look at the great job I’ve done. I brought the rate of increase down to 3%. Just a month ago it was 100%!” I don’t need to show you a graph for this one, The “deaths per day” graph is a straight horizontal line, and the “percentage increase” graph shows a smaller percentage every day, falling quickly at first, then flattening (but still falling slightly) toward the end of the month.
Example Two: a sample situation that gets steadily worse every day. Let’s imagine country B, where the situation just keeps getting worse: one death on day 1, two on day 2, three on day three … until there are 30 on day 30. The daily graph of deaths by day will look like this:
But the percentage of increase in the deaths will look like this:
The percentage increase on day 2 will be 200%, day 3 will be 100%, day 4 will be 67%, etc. The percentage increase will be less every day, although the day-to-day decrease will be very small on the end of the month. (You can see that the graph is nearly flat, but never totally flat as the month ends.) Still, President Pompadour can step up to the podium on the first day of the next month and say, “Look at what a great job I’ve done. I have gotten the increase down to 7% per day. Just a month ago it was 200%.”
So what you want to look at is the graph of deaths per day. That will give you a good picture of how a country is progressing. If you want to get fancy, graph the raw numbers, a 3-day rolling average and a 7-day rolling average to get a better picture of what the trend would look like without anomalies, glitches and flukes. Here’s what those three graphs look like for Italy so far, and I think it gives a good picture of how bad or good things really have been.
The Dow is up about 2400 since the close of trading Friday – more than 11% in three days.
Bernie Sanders Ends His 2020 Presidential Campaign
“If I believed we had a feasible path to the nomination, I would certainly continue the campaign, but it’s just not there”
“John Prine, who for five decades wrote rich, plain-spoken songs that chronicled the struggles and stories of everyday working people and changed the face of modern American roots music, died Tuesday at Nashville’s Vanderbilt University Medical Center. He was 73. The cause was complications related to COVID-19, his family confirmed to Rolling Stone.”
The stats: Coronavirus mapped and quantified.
- world outbreak monitored
- world outbreak mapped
- world testing tracked
- USA outbreak mapped
- USA testing tracked daily
ADDED 4/9: The USA’s # of cases held flat with the previous day (actually slightly down to 1,940 from 1,971).
The USA can be fairly compared to the “Big 5” European corona countries (France, Italy, Spain, Germany, UK), which together have a population of 323.4 million, which is almost identical to the population of the USA (327.2).
America has 435,000 corona cases, versus 575,000 for the Big 5
America has 15,000 deaths, versus 53,000 for the Big 5.
America has conducted 2.2 million tests, versus approximately 3.4 million for the Big 5.
America reported more new cases yesterday: 32,000-25,000
The Big 5 reported more new deaths yesterday: 3,100-2,000
The Big 5’s test numbers are estimated because of Spain. Worldometers has the up-to-date numbers for The UK, Germany and Italy. Worldometers has the wrong number for France, but the correct number can be calculated. France reports that 27% of their tests have been positive. Given their number of positives, they must have conducted about 418,000 tests. Nobody seems to know how many people Spain has tested, so my estimate of 600,000 for Spain is a total guess, based on assuming 25% positive tests, which is the average of France (27%) and the UK (22%).
US testing is still in the second tier. Germany has tested 15 people per 1000, Italy 13. The USA and France are about half that level. The UK lags far behind at 4 per 1000. Spain, as noted, is unknown.
UPDATED 4/9: BoJo, covid positive, still in intensive care, but now improving.
ADDED 4/8: Key coronavirus model revised downward, now predicts 60K deaths in US by August. The previous prediction from the same model was 81,000. You can find the data for your own state here. Click on “The United States of America” in green and white, and it will produce a drop-down menu of countries and states.
NOTE: this model assumes full social distancing in all 50 states until May 31, even though many states will be down to 0-2 deaths per day by May 1. I fear that many governors, seeing the numbers drop so dramatically, will rescind their stay-in-place orders, and that would create a new bump in the curve. I hope the forecasters are right in predicting a steady decline in fatalities after April 12th. That suggests we are nearly over the hump.
ADDED 4/7: This can’t be good. 51 recovered coronavirus patients test positive again in South Korea. For now, the KCDC’s director-general, Jeong Eun-kyeong, believes it is likely the infection was re-activated after remaining dormant in the patients, as opposed to them being reinfected. Either way, it strengthens fears that the contagion remains a hidden danger even after it appears to have gone — with whistleblowing Chinese doctors previously warning it is even deadlier the second time.
ADDED 4/3: “The Unemployment Rate Is Probably Around 13 Percent. It’s almost certainly at its highest level since the Great Depression.”
NEW 3/28: The data are beginning to reveal that covid-19 is much more dangerous for men. The data are consistent from country to country: men make up 72% of the intensive care unit admissions in Spain, 73% in France, 75% in Norway, 71% in the UK. While researchers cannot yet determine how much of the gender disparity can be attributed to behavioral components, it seems clear that the significance of the gap across cultures means that there must be some biological explanation.
NEW 3/28: Why is Germany’s death rate so much lower than everyone else’s? Nobody is certain. There are several possible reasons: (1) aggressive testing has identified many mild cases; (2) the average age of those infected is low – for example, it’s 46 in Germany, 63 in Italy; (3) they have a good healthcare system and an aggressive government; (4) the fatality numbers are not-apples-to-apples because other countries are routinely doing post-mortem tests on those who were not tested in life, while Germany is not. (When a corpse is tested positive, it adds to the infected total, as well as the total of those who had covid-19 and died – in effect weighing in a 100% death rate for that group.)
An MIT study, Will Coronavirus Pandemic Diminish by Summer?, suggests that 90% of transmission occurs within a narrow temperature band (37 to 63 F) and absolute humidity band. The scientists do not claim that transmission ceases outside those temperature and humidity bands, but that the spread occurs more slowly. If that holds, the Asian monsoon season, as well as the North American summer, should work against the disease.
Feb 26: “We have thousands or hundreds of thousands of people that get better, just by, you know, even going to work. Some of them go to work, but they get better.”
Feb 26: “We’re going down, not up. We’re going very substantially down, not up..”
Feb 26: “The 15 within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero.”
Feb 24:
The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA. We are in contact with everyone and all relevant countries. CDC & World Health have been working hard and very smart. Stock Market starting to look very good to me!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 24, 2020
The Dow was at 27,960 that day. One month later it was at 18,592.
Al was about 18 or 19 in this photo from his 1954 card. The following year, at age 20, he won the AL batting championship with a .340 mark. He was one day younger than Ty Cobb had been when Cobb won the batting title in 1907, making Kaline the youngest batting champion ever, a mark that has endured to this day.
“Al Kaline, who in a long and unique Detroit Tigers lifetime grew from youthful batting champion to Hall of Famer to distinguished elder statesman, died Monday afternoon at his home in Bloomfield Hills. He was 85.”
If you are a baby boomer and a baseball fan, you certainly remember him well. He never played an inning for any pro team but the Tigers, not even in the minors. He was probably the 2nd-best American leaguer of his era, behind Mickey. He never won an MVP, but he finished second twice and third once – and finished in the top ten six more times!
He is considered one of the two best defensive right fielders of his time, perhaps of all time, alongside Roberto Clemente.
Kaline had nowhere near Mickey Mantle’s power, but thanks to his consistency and a 22-year career, he managed to hit 399 lifetime homers without ever reaching 30 in a season, and in 1959 he even managed to lead the AL in slugging average, upsetting the favored Mantle.
This doesn’t surprise me. Every time I hear bagpipe music, I say, “I have to get the fuck out of here.”
Wrong: Coronavirus is bad, and the extent of the problem can be attributed to America’s poor leadership
How to ensure you don't get follow-up questions on Fox, apparently. pic.twitter.com/nOUqw4ZVhO
— Ben Smith (@benyt) April 2, 2020
Right: Coronavirus is actually good
Secretary Wilbur Ross says coronavirus will be good for [checks notes] American jobs: "I think it will help to accelerate the return of jobs to North America." pic.twitter.com/Y4SbDIcTi4
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) January 30, 2020
In 2012, a team of Japanese researchers were analyzing tree rings dating to the years 774/775, when they noticed an enormous surprise. Instead of the typical variations they were used to, they saw a spike that was 20 times larger than normal. After years of analysis, the unlikely culprit has finally been revealed.”
“If you happen to utter the word “coronavirus” while waiting, say, for the bus in the white-marbled capital Ashgabat, there’s a good chance you’ll be arrested. Plainclothes police officers are also arresting people who wear face masks.”
The Turkmen government has been run since 2006 by “the flamboyant dentist-rapper strongman Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov.”
Heckuva job, Gurby!
SIDEBAR: I’m pretty sure than I’ve never typed “dentist-rapper-strongman” before. That’s almost as rare as my position as “philosopher prince / masked luchador” (emeritus).
It was apparently written by Nostradamus:
“Trump vs. ‘disease X’ The administration is setting up the US to botch a pandemic response.”
DOJ turns over unredacted Mueller report to US District Judge Reggie Walton in DC, per court order // Earlier: https://t.co/4AwQXqswHt pic.twitter.com/uuJ2x3u8uF
— Mike Scarcella (@MikeScarcella) March 30, 2020
MA received 17% of requested medical supplies from the Trump admin. ME: 5%. CO: 1 day's worth.
FL got everything they requested. + an identical shipment the next week. oh, and a 3rd is on the way.https://t.co/4AmYkn70Jm pic.twitter.com/ZUCGF2NsfX
— Jesse Lehrich (@JesseLehrich) March 29, 2020
To be fair, this may make some sense, although I don’t know the details. I can’t say for sure that I would not have made the same decision, given the authority. Florida is likely to be the state that will take the hardest beating in the long run, given the age of the population.
But you have to be suspicious every time Trump does something.
“Rhode Island will knock on doors and stop cars to find New Yorkers to slow the spread of coronavirus”
That CNN headline (above, within quotation marks) is at least somewhat misleading. They are not looking for New Yorkers, but rather for anyone who has recently been to New York.
“Trump businesses barred from getting coronavirus stimulus money”
(It’s not just Trump. The law applies to any high-ranking public official in the executive or legislative branches of the federal government.)