NYS just extended the lockdown to April 15.

Source?

Google helps, not even a minute of searching, and I found this:

https://www.theverge.com/2020/3/17/21184015/coronavirus-testing-pcr-diagnostic-point-of-care-cdc-techonology

"A week after the genetic sequence for the novel coronavirus first became available in January, German researchers had designed a PCR test that could detect the virus in a patient sample. That test became the basis for the World Health Organization’s (WHO) test used in countries around the world, including South Korea, but which the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) declined to use."

https://www.businessinsider.fr/us/us-coronavirus-testing-problems-timeline-2020-3

A little timeline of things in the US

I gave this a good read, it's the most comprehensive study yet
https://www.imperial.ac.uk/media/imperial-college/medicine/sph/ide/gida-fellowships/Imperial-College-COVID19-Global-Impact-26-03-2020.pdf

They are comparing the impact on different countries from low income on the left, high income on the right, with different strategies


For reference the number of ICU beds available in different countries ranges from 1.63% of 1.24 hospital beds per 1,000 = 7.8 ICU beds per 100,000 in low income countries to 3.57% of 4.82 hospital beds per 1,000 = 17.2 ICU beds per 100,000 in high income countries.

The bottom row represents mitigation or flattening the curve. Low income countries need less ICU beds since the average age is lower. However they also have less ICU beds per 100,000 available and for any mitigation strategy the healthcare system won't be able to cope in any way.

The top row is suppression based on when measures are put in place. The metric used is how many people died / 100,000 in the week prior to suppression. For example Italy locked down on March 9th, from March 2nd to March 9th, Italy recorded 325 deaths = 0.54 / 100,000, somewhere between the blue line and the one below in figure D.

The earlier you start suppression, the much smaller the initial peak.


These are their current estimates:


(Trump got his facts from here citing 2.2 million for the USA "Our estimated impact of an unmitigated scenario in the UK and the USA for a reproduction number, R0, of 2.4 (490,000 deaths and 2,180,000 deaths respectively)")

Note that these numbers are based on sufficient ICU beds being available. The impact will be higher when health care systems can't shoulder the burden. And even with early suppression, the estimated death toll far exceeds that of the flu.

Do your part on physical distancing!



One big disclaimer

It is important to note that we do not quantify the wider societal and economic impact of such intensive suppression approaches; these are likely to be substantial. Nor do we quantify the potentially different societal and economic impact of mitigation strategies.

Moreover, for countries lacking the infrastructure capable of implementing technology-led suppression maintenance strategies such as those currently being pursued in Asia, and in the absence of a vaccine or other effective therapy (as well as the possibility of resurgence), careful thought will need to be given to pursuing such strategies in order to avoid a high risk of future health system failure once suppression measures are lifted.

Left for later studies no doubt.



Btw many countries already started with measures before reaching the 0.2 deaths per 100,000 per week. For example Canada is at 0.1 currently and has been ramping up suppression for a while. Of course it also depends where it spreads first (young or old) and whether all deaths are correctly assigned to covid19. There is a spreadsheet linked in that pdf with more detailed per country information but I can't open it for some reason.

These are all projections based on different strategies. They took all the current available data and observations to make these predictions, but the predictions do not take into account what has already happened / is going on currently. All the simulations are from a clean slate and not adjusted for actually running out of hospital beds. So it's more like best case scenarios out of different strategies.

For example Italy started with suppression way past the optimal, at 0.54 deaths / 100.000, while their lower estimate starts at 0.2 deaths / 100.000 to trigger suppression. But on the other hand, some countries started with (partial) suppression before reaching 0.2 deaths / 100.000.

It is not a projection what is going to happen, but what can happen when following different strategies. The problem is, it's better to be early than too late. The peaks rise drastically when you wait.

Anyway I'm not familiar with an article from the Washington post citing we're already past the hope for less than 15 million deaths?


And yep good question, what after the suppression phase. (What other 5 billion do you mean?) They haven't got that far yet :/

Moreover, for countries lacking the infrastructure capable of implementing technology-led suppression maintenance strategies such as those currently being pursued in Asia, and in the absence of a vaccine or other effective therapy (as well as the possibility of resurgence), careful thought will need to be given to pursuing such strategies in order to avoid a high risk of future health system failure once suppression measures are lifted.

Basically, if we can't maintain the same maintenance strategies as China and South Korea, we could be in for another ride after the initial wave has passed.

Looks like the death toll in China is more then likely a lot higher then the reported numbers according to a Newsweek article that got published today.

It wouldn't trust any trends over the weekend. The exact same thing happens through most of the data every 7 days... Reporting is likely a bit slower in the weekend, everything dropped a bit. Although the USA did have that spike last week in the weekend.

Looking at the past 5 days, USA is keeping pace with Europe pretty well.

March 25: 8.22 days behind
March 26: 8.38 days behind
March 27: 8.27 days behind
March 28: 8.29 days behind
March 29: 8.43 days behind

Meaning in 8.43 days, on April 6th, the USA will likely be where Europe is now, which is 391K cases.


Ontario did manage to catch up a bit on tests, now 'only' 7.2K tests pending, but that also netted the biggest gain yet, +211 to 1355 in the province. Quebec still leads in Canada with 2840 cases.

Disregarding all of China's manufacturing because you bought some broken shit on alibaba is like disregarding all of the US because your craigslist hookup tried to rape you.

I'm actually surprised so many people were so gullible that they took the official numbers seriously.

It's very likely that the death toll is higher in many european countries too, I'm afraid.

Things are looking good in South Australia. Second consecutive day of lower confirmed cases.