COVID-19 Compilation: Part 31 - October 25-31, 2020
On March 14th, I began posting COVID-19 updates to my facebook page, regarding the status of the COVID-19 pandemic. I have used data from worldometer as a primary source for daily and cumulative data, with frequent supplementation from various national and local sites.
This blog post compiles the period of October 25th through 31st. see https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ for more
OCTOBER 25
| Today's counts | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Location | Total Cases | Cases Today | Total Deaths | Deaths Today |
| World | 43.36 million | 424,257 | 1.159 million | 4,629 |
| USA | 8.89 million | 63,510 | 230,510 | 442 |
At least in terms of deaths, they are lower today. However, world cases exceeded 400,000 for the 5th consecutive day and USA cases exceeded 60,000 for the 6th consecutive day.
There were 17,709 new cases in Belgium today. That's one out of every 655 people in the entire country. France had more cases than India today. There were more than 20,000 new cases in Italy.
On the USA, Missouri set a new record for deaths today. Also, Texas has now had more COVID-19 cases than any other state, ahead of California. Texas will likely surpass one million total cases shortly after election day.
OCTOBER 26
| Today's counts | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Location | Total Cases | Cases Today | Total Deaths | Deaths Today |
| World | 43.78 million | 412,267 | 1.164 million | 5,095 |
| USA | 8.96 million | 69,841 | 231,045 | 529 |
Six days ago, a message from Mark S. Schlissel, M.D., Ph.D., President of the University of Michigan, was sent to all members of the campus community.
The letter began:
"COVID-19 cases are increasing on our campus, and in the region, state, and nation. As we noted last Friday in our weekly briefing, increases among students both on and off campus are heightening the pressure on our case investigators, contact tracers, and quarantine and isolation housing capacity.
"Today, the Washtenaw County Health Department, in collaboration with the university, issued a 14-day Stay in Place order for our undergraduate students, which goes into effect immediately. We fully support this action, as it enhances protections for our students and the welfare of our community. We also are implementing steps beyond the order out of an abundance of caution and to provide choices for students and instructors, including moving more of our undergraduate courses to fully remote instruction."
Under the new guidelines, most instruction was moved to online only. Undergraduates can leave their residences "to attend class; pick up food, medication and other basic needs; for medical appointments; voting or volunteering as poll workers; attending religious practice activities; or obtaining COVID-19 testing."
Our sophomore came home today.
OCTOBER 28
| Today's counts | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Location | Total Cases | Cases Today | Total Deaths | Deaths Today |
| World | 44.77 million | 507,541 | 1.179 million | 7,116 |
| USA | 9.12 million | 81,585 | 233,130 | 1,030 |
Both blue states and red states, they died just the same...
On September 16th, the President of the United States said, "...blue states had tremendous death rates... If you take the blue states out, "we're at a level that I don't think anybody in the world would be at. We're really at a very low level but some of the states – they were blue states, and blue-state managed."
Per the worldometer tabulations, as of today more people have perished from COVID-19 in "red states," that is, states that voted for Donald Trump in 2016, than in "blue states."
In the time since September 16th, 70% of US deaths have occurred in the states that voted gave their electoral votes to Trump 4 years ago. The attached tables show the states that have had the most COVID-19 related deaths since September 16th, first by totals deaths, then per capita.
 |
| Highest total deaths by states, September 16th - October 28th |
 |
| Highest per capita deaths by states, September 16th - October 28th |
OCTOBER 29
| Today's counts | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Location | Total Cases | Cases Today | Total Deaths | Deaths Today |
| World | 45.32 million | 548,856 | 1.186 million | 7,157 |
| USA | 9.21 million | 91,834 | 234,171 | 1,041 |
The global case number demolished yesterday's record by nearly 40,000 cases. Italy, Spain, Belgium, Poland and Germany were among the European countries smashing case records today. Belgium recorded an eye-popping 1,783 cases per million people today.
The USA case number obliterated the prior national record by about 10,000 cases.
| 10 states with new highs for COVID-19 cases today: | |
|---|---|
| State | Cases Today |
| Illinois | 6,363 |
| Indiana | 3,618 |
| Maine | 80 |
| Michigan | 4,109 |
| Minnesota | 2,867 |
| Nebraska | 1,605 |
| New Mexico | 1,078 |
| North Carolina | 2,885 |
| North Dakota | 1,223 |
| Ohio | 3,579 |
North Dakota had 1,605 cases per million people today, that is the highest mark for any state on any day so far during the pandemic.
The Washington Post led today with this headline: "Coronavirus cases are on the rise in every swing state"
The New York Times, meanwhile, led with this: "Death Rates Have Dropped for Seriously Ill Covid Patients"
For the moment, both headlines are true.
OCTOBER 30
| Today's counts | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Location | Total Cases | Cases Today | Total Deaths | Deaths Today |
| World | 45.89 million | 573,614 | 1.193 million | 7,513 |
| USA | 9.32 million | 101,461 | 235,159 | 988 |
100,000.
On June 30th, Dr. Anthony Fauci said, "I would not be surprised if we go up to 100,000 [cases] a day if this does not turn around and so I am very concerned."
At the time, the US record for cases was less than 50,000. Some denialists mocked Fauci.
Within days, the White House trade advisor Peter Navarro said, “Dr. Fauci has a good bedside manner with the public but he has been wrong about everything I have ever interacted with him on."
The US July spike topped out at less than 80,000 cases on its worst day, going down to a low of about 25,000 on Labor Day. IF you went out to the twitter pages of celebrated skeptics, you would have seen mockery.
Today, sadly, Fauci's prediction became reality for the first time, as the USA became the first country to surpass 100,000 cases on a single day.
The world total demolished yesterday's record by nearly 30,000, while the US total obliterated yesterday's by 10,000.
| 14 states with new highs for COVID-19 cases today: | |
|---|---|
| State | Cases Today |
| Colorado | 2,412 |
| Illinois | 7,164 |
| Iowa | 2,823 |
| Kansas | 2,877 |
| Kentucky | 1,937 |
| Maine | 103 |
| Minnesota | 3,154 |
| Montana | 1,063 |
| North Dakota | 1,353 |
| Ohio | 3,826 |
| South Dakota | 1,559 |
| Utah | 2,292 |
| West Virginia | 524 |
| Wyoming | 521 |
| 2 states with new highs for COVID-19 deaths today: | |
| State | Deaths Today |
| Tennessee | 78 |
| Montana | 27 |
OCTOBER 31
| Today's counts | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Location | Total Cases | Cases Today | Total Deaths | Deaths Today |
| World | 46.37 million | 475,382 | 1.200 million | 6,504 |
| USA | 9.40 million | 86,293 | 236,072 | 914 |
| This week's counts | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Location | Total Cases | Percent Change | Total Deaths | Percent Change |
| World | 3.41 million | +15.3% | 45,081 | +11.8% |
| USA | 571,416 | +20.4% | 5,998 | +4.1% |
Colorado, Illinois, Kentucky, North Dakota and Wisconsin all set new single-day case records today. The North Dakota per capita rate today of 1,880 cases per million population is a new record for any state on any day since the start of the pandemic. This week marks the 5th consecutive week in which the rate of growth in US cases has exceeded that of the prior week. Not to get too deep in to the math, but:
- When the rate of change is positive each week, that means we're getting more cases each week.
- When the rate of change is positive and the same each week by quantity (e.g., 5,000 more cases each week than the week before), that means we have linear growth.
- When the rate of change is positive and the same each week by ratio (e.g., 10% more cases each week than the week before), that means we have exponential growth.
Because of variances in testing rates and other factors, it is an imprecise exercise to try to classify the current case growth curve in the USA, except to say: it is presently exponential plus.
To the extent there is the appearance of a silver lining, it's that USA deaths, while also going up, are going up at a far slower pace. This week's numbers was the highest in 8 weeks, but was still nowhere near the weeks ending April 18th and April 25th, when more than 15,000 people died from COVID-19 in the USA each week.
But that silver lining, too, may be a bit of a distortion effect due to the extreme highs of those earlier totals.
Worldwide deaths outside the USA were 39,083 this past week, a new record. The chart below shows the worldwide death totals, week by week, excluding the USA, since the beginning of the pandemic.
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| World COVID-19 deaths, excluding USA, by week |
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