The world has 3.3 million cases. Cases have grown by about 600,000 in the last week, just as they did the week before. The US has nearly 1.1 million cases. The US has had over 2,200 deaths since yesterday.
Even though 50% of adults in the US have experienced job loss or work hour reductions, we still endorse social distancing measures. Polling shows people aren’t ready to return to business-as-usual because they expect the pandemic to continue burning through the population. Most believe there will be a second wave coming.
Trump says he won’t extend social distancing on the federal level. The current federal guidelines expire today. He has asserted on-air that the worst is behind us. We are peaking/plateauing, but opening up at the peak may drive case numbers higher. The Administration entrusts governors to manage their own social distancing guidelines from here.
Here’s one way to deter social gatherings in public:
The city of Lund in Sweden has decided to spread chicken manure in its parks to discourage people from gathering amid the #coronavirus because of its unpleasant smell.
Get the latest on #COVID19 here: https://t.co/q7A14GZMGb pic.twitter.com/tjD6rpIJLf
— SkyNews (@SkyNews) April 30, 2020
Georgia drops driving test and trusts parents to endorse their child’s readiness to drive.
California Governor Gavin Newsom thinks too many people went to the beaches in the past few weeks, so he put an end to it:
#BREAKING Newsom to order all California beaches closed after seeing Orange County crowdshttps://t.co/SRZk37ELwy
— ABC7 Eyewitness News (@ABC7) April 30, 2020
Speaking of California, Mayor Garcetti says any LA resident can get a test, symptomatic or not. Previously only the symptomatic or those classified as essential workers had access to testing through the city or county. Los Angeles County has half of all of California’s cases.
Europe’s got a very accurate antibody test. It’s made by Abbott and it’s 99% specific. I’m dying to know why we don’t have broad antibody testing in the US, and I’m unhappy with how poor the sensitivity and specificity of both swabs for active illness and antibody tests for previous illness have been here. Incidentally, the sensitivity of a test is the ability of that test to generate a true positive (not a false positive), and specificity is the ability of a test to generate a true negative (and not a false negative).
Florida Man (Governor DeSantis?) stops medical examiners from releasing official COVID-19 death tolls for the state. Florida Man cites privacy concerns. Post-mortem records aren’t covered by federal HIPAA privacy laws, though—they’re public record.
The economy? It’s worse than the Great Depression. According to the Federal Reserve Chairman, it’s the worst we’ve ever seen. One of the biggest drivers of decline is a decrease in health care spending—particularly elective surgeries.
You are reporting the comment """ by on