(Abbreviated) coronavirus dashboard for March 29

 - by New Deal democrat

Here is the update through yesterday (March 28) 

[NOTE: I am not including the State by State breakdown today, which is time-intensive to create. It will resume tomorrow.]

In order to succeed in containing the pandemic, I believe that the US needs 2 weeks of China (nearly complete lockdown) followed by at least a month of South Korea (very aggressive and widespread testing). 

At minimum, that means at least 50% of the US population under lockdown and a ratio of 15:1 in tests to results showing infection. The recent exponential growth of about 35% per day must be stopped. Those three most important metrics are starred (***) below.

As of now, about 60% of the population is under total or business lockdown, and the rate of increase in new infections decelerated significantly - but is still growing at over 20%/day averaged over the last 5 days. The amount of testing continues to increase, but still is falling far short of what is necessary for a successful regimen.

Number and rate of increase of Reported Infections (from Johns Hopkins via arcgis.com)

• Number: up +19,849 to 124,686 (vs. +18,825 on March 27)
• ***Rate of increase: day/day: 19% (vs. 34.6% baseline and vs. 22% on March 27)

I have been using Jim Bianco’s excellent exponential projection of 34.5% growth from March 10 as my baseline. It appears that “social distancing” strategies as well as State-mandated partial and total lockdowns may have begun to put a dent in the exponential rate of increase, as the average rate of increase for the past 5 days has been 22%.

Note: Ben Engebreth, whose Department of Numbers used to track house prices back in the housing bubble days, has started tracking coronvirus infection and testing numbers, with graphs. You can find it here.

Number and rate of increase of testing (from COVID Tracking Project)

• Number: 109,071, up +1,742 vs. 107,329 on March 27 day/day
• Rate: increase of 2% vs. number of tests previous day

Comparison of rates of increase in documented infections vs. testing  

• Infections +19% vs. Tests +2% day/day

Result: The rate of testing is failing to improve and is far, far below what is needed, which is probably now at least 200,000/day. Note this number is also increasing exponentially as we try to chase the number of exponentially increasing infections.

Ratio of tests to positives for infection (from COVID Tracking Project)

• Number: 109,071 new tests vs. 18,821 new diagnosed infections 
• ***Ratio: 5.8:1 

In South Korea, where aggressive testing has led to a near-total disappearance of new cases, the inflection point where the number of new daily cases plateaued was reached when the ratio of tests to new cases found reached 15:1. Any ratio less than that suggests that not enough testing is being done. Yesterday’s ratio of 5.8:1 is poor - and has been worsening for the past week, I.e., we are falling further and further behind in testing.

Brace yourselves: the US is setting up a ghastly “natural experiment”

- by New Deal democrat

When I began my “Coronavirus Dashboard,” I was hopeful that it would document the slow progress towards turning a bad situation around, and the ultimate tamping down of the pandemic. Surely increasingly intense and overwhelming public pressure would force a critical mass of government officials to do what was necessary?

Now I am not so sure. The number of cases continue to climb at a double-digit exponential rate, if a less aggressive one than earlier in March. But even more infuriating is that the President of the United States is all but advocating for letting the virus run free come Easter Sunday. This has had a marked effect. The march to universal Statewide lockdowns has almost screeched to a halt. Most importantly, GOP governors in the Confederacy and in the High Plains, plus Arizona, have completely put the brakes on any statewide “stay in place” orders.

And even in those States which have taken relatively aggressive efforts at containment, the level of testing, let alone isolation and quarantine of identified cases, is running far below what is necessary. In fact it looks like it is falling further and further behind.

In short, I suspect that my dashboard is instead going to document the catastrophe of a deadly pandemic allowed to get completely out of control.

Earlier this month I documented, almost daily, how the pandemic was spreading at an average 34.6% daily. Last Monday, I projected that rate forward another 15 days, meaning that by April 5 there would be 2,500,000 cases. Here’s what the actual growth looks like so far compared with that projection:

Date.     Projection Actual

Mar 22: 36,001       35,224

Mar 23: 48,458.     46,450

Mar 24: 65,224.      55,225

Mar 25: 87,792.       69,197

Mar 26: 118,168.     86,012

Mar 27: 159,054.    104,837
Mar 28: 214,087.    124,686 

The actual rate of increase is approximately 24% for each of the last 7 days. On a “less worse” note, the rate is only 22% over the last 5 days. Even more alarming, here are the dates in which the number of cases expanded by 10:

Mar 2 100

Mar 10 1,000

Mar 19 10,000

Mar 28 100,000

Every 8 or 9 days, the number of infections have risen 10-fold. Let’s project that forward:

Apr 6 1 million

Apr 15 10 million

Apr 22 100 million

At this rate, by the end of April, every man, woman, and child in the US would be infected. That won’t happen, if for no other reason than the virus will spread less efficiently once it mainly “spreads” to people who have already recovered and so will have developed antibody immunity to it.

And here is a graph from Kevin Drum, showing that at the rate deaths have been growing in March, by April 26 there will have been *1 million* US deaths from coronavirus:

To be blunt: so far “social distancing” has only slowed down the exponential rate of increase. While the effects of State and region-wide lockdowns aren’t yet apparent, the fact that testing isn’t keeping up means that we are far, far away from South Korea style monitoring. Another two or three weeks of this kind of exponential growth and the pandemic will simply be pervasive and out of control. Against that the only hope is that the advent of warmer weather in April might naturally damp down the spread, but don’t hold your breath for that.

Against that background, let me get to the second part of my essay: a ghastly “natural experiment” is being set up in three regions of the US.

Here is The NY Times’s most recent map, from Friday March 27, of States that are under total lockdowns plus States where there are only some municipal or regional lockdowns:

Since that time, Alaska, Kansas, and Rhode Island have also gone to statewide lockdown. Both Pennsylvania and Utah are under close to statewide lockdowns.

In other words, the US has 3 regions of coronavirus response:

1. Every State in the Mountain and Pacific West, plus Alaska and Hawaii, is under statewide or nearly statewide lockdown, with the exception of Wyoming and Arizona.

2. Every State in the old Union, except for Iowa, Maine, and Maryland, plus North Carolina, is under statewide lockdowns (and really wtf is up with Governor Northam of Virginia, who is a physician?!?) 

3. No State in the old Confederacy run by a GOP governor, with the exception of Louisiana, or in the Great Plains west of the Mississippi, except for Kansas, is under a lockdown.

The “natural experiment” that is going to take place over the next few weeks is the rate of spread in the first two regions vs. the third region.

Most likely, over the next two weeks the rate of increase in - and possibly the actual number of - infections in the locked down regions will decrease, while number of infections in the region not locked down will likely continue to grow at an exponential rate, albeit perhaps at a slower one. 

Brace yourselves. What has happened in March with regard to the effects of this pandemic is akin to only the first inning of a baseball game. This is almost certainly going to get a lot worse.

Weekly Indicators for March 23 - 27 at Seeking Alpha

 - by New Deal democrat

My Weekly Indicators post is up at Seeking Alpha.

As you might expect, almost all of the “hard” indicators have crashed. What sticks out is that consumer spending, as measured by chain store sales, has not - even though one week ago the coronavirus restrictions were very much in place in many regions.

As usual, clicking over and reading will bring you thoroughly up to date. It also helps reward me for my efforts, especially now that I have cut back on posting there in order to spend a lot of time documenting what is happening and what is likely to happen going forward with the coronavirus pandemic.

Coronavirus dashboard for March 28: testing falls further behind

 - by New Deal democrat

Here is the update through yesterday (March 27) 

In order to succeed in containing the pandemic, I believe that the US needs 2 weeks of China (nearly complete lockdown) followed by at least a month of South Korea (very aggressive and widespread testing). 

At minimum, that means at least 50% of the US population under lockdown and a ratio of 15:1 in tests to results showing infection. The recent exponential growth of about 35% per day must be stopped. Those three most important metrics are starred (***) below. 

As of now, just over 50% of the population is under total or business lockdown, and the rate of increase in new infections decelerated significantly - but is still growing at near 25%/day. The amount of testing continues to increase, but still is falling far short of what is necessary for a successful regimen.

Number and rate of increase of Reported Infections (from Johns Hopkins via arcgis.com)

• Number: up +18,825 to 104,837 (vs. +16,815 on March 27)
• ***Rate of increase: day/day: 22% (vs. 34.6% baseline and vs. 24% on March 27)

I am using Jim Bianco’s excellent exponential projection of 34.5% growth from March 10 as my baseline. It appears that “social distancing” strategies as well as State-mandated partial and total lockdowns may have begun to put a dent in the exponential rate of increase, as the average rate of increase for the past 4 days has been 22.5%.

Note: Ben Engebreth, whose Department of Numbers used to track house prices back in the housing bubble days, has started tracking coronvirus infection and testing numbers, with graphs. You can find it here.

Number and rate of increase of testing (from COVID Tracking Project)

• Number: 107,329, up +9,523 vs. 97,816 on March 26 day/day
• Rate: increase of 10% vs. number of tests previous day

Comparison of rates of increase in documented infections vs. testing  

• Infections +22% vs. Tests +10% day/day

Result: The rate of testing is failing to improve and is far, far below what is needed, which is probably now at least 200,000/day. Note this number is also increasing exponentially as we try to chase the number of exponentially increasing infections.

Ratio of tests to positives for infection (from COVID Tracking Project)

• Number: 107,329 new tests vs. 18,712 new diagnosed infections 
• ***Ratio: 5.7:1 

In South Korea, where aggressive testing has led to a near-total disappearance of new cases, the inflection point where the number of new daily cases plateaued was reached when the ratio of tests to new cases found reached 15:1. Any ratio less than that suggests that not enough testing is being done. Yesterday’s ratio of 5.7:1 is poor - and has been worsening for the past week, I.e., we are falling further and further behind in testing.

Number of States (+DC and Puerto Rico) in total lockdown, business lockdown, and partial restrictions

• Total lockdown (personal + business): 25 (AK, CA, CO, CT, DE, HI, ID, IL, IN, LA, MN, NC, NH, NM, MI, MT, NJ, NY, OH, OR, PR, VT, WA, WI, WV)
• Business lockdown: 7 (DC, KY, MA, MD, ME*, NV, PA*)
• Partial restrictions on business (restaurants and bars): 14 (AL, FL*, GA*, IA, MO*, MS, ND, RI, SC*, TN*, TX*, UT*, VA, WY) 
• School closure only: 5 (AZ**, AR, KS, OK**, SD)  
• No mandatory restrictions: 1 (NE*) 

*some local areas are under lockdowns

**some local areas with partial restrictions

With the exception of Arizona, all of the remaining States with no restrictions or only school closures are rural. The only news today is that North Carolina (a big State) and Alaska both went to Statewide lockdowns.

Number and percent of US population in total lockdown, business lockdown, and partial restrictions

• ***Total lockdown: 153.2 million, 46.2% 
• ***Business lockdown: 39.2 million, 11.8%
• Partial restrictions on business (bars, restaurants): 104.4 million, 31.5%
• School closure only: 15.7 million, 4.7%
• No mandatory restrictions: 1.9 million, 0.6%

Earlier this week, there was a decisive move towards more restrictive measures across the board. This has all but ground to a halt across the southern “red” States. Continued exponential growth in those cases will teach a brutal lesson.

Over half of the total US population, including metro areas in some non-lockdown States,  is under total lockdown. That is the percentage, AT MINIMUM, I think we need to have a chance of following China’s successful strategy for beating back the pandemic. 

The deceleration of the rate of increase in new cases may be the first signs that “social distancing” is bearing some limited fruit. But a deceleration in the exponential rate of increase still means the US as a whole is failing.

Further, the rate of testing, while having increased tremendously, still remains abysmally too low compared with the spread of the virus. In other words, we are still chasing the virus, and we are falling further behind.

There is NO HOPE that the federal government under Trump will take necessary steps. Therefore those States which have gone to lockdowns need to cooperate regionally in quarantining incoming visitors at airports, train stations and at highway checkpoints.

Coronavirus dashboard for March 27: (unsurprisingly) voluntary distancing appears to be failing

 - by New Deal democrat

Here is the update through yesterday (March 26) 

In order to succeed in containing the pandemic, I believe that the US needs 2 weeks of China (nearly complete lockdown) followed by at least a month of South Korea (very aggressive and widespread testing). 

At minimum, that means at least 50% of the US population under lockdown and a ratio of 15:1 in tests to results showing infection. The recent exponential growth of about 35% per day must be stopped. Those three most important metrics are starred (***) below. 

As of now, just over 50% of the population is under total or business lockdown, and the rate of increase in new infections decelerated significantly - but is still growing at near 25%/day. The amount of testing continues to increase, but still is falling far short of what is necessary for a successful regimen.

Number and rate of increase of Reported Infections (from Johns Hopkins via arcgis.com)

• Number: up +16,815 to 86,012 (vs. +16,815 on March 26)
• ***Rate of increase: day/day: 24% (vs. 34.6% baseline and vs. 25% on March 26)

I am using Jim Bianco’s excellent exponential projection of 34.5% growth from March 10 as my baseline. It appears that “social distancing” strategies as well as State-mandated partial and total lockdowns may have begun to put a dent in this, as yesterday’s +25% and Tuesday’s+19% have been 2 of the 3 lowest rates of increase in the past two+ weeks. At the same time, it remains an exponential growth rate.

Note: Ben Engebreth, whose Department of Numbers used to track house prices back in the housing bubble days, has started tracking coronvirus infection and testing numbers, with graphs. You can find it here.

Number and rate of increase of testing (from COVID Tracking Project)

• Number: 97,816, up +23,734 vs. 74,082 on March 25 day/day
• Rate: increase of 32% vs. number of tests previous day

Comparison of rates of increase in documented infections vs. testing  

• Infections +24% vs. Tests +32% day/day

Result: The rate of testing is improving but remains far, far below what is needed, which is probably now at least 150,000/day.

Ratio of tests to positives for infection (from COVID Tracking Project)

• Number: 97,816 new tests vs. 16,807 new diagnosed infections 
• ***Ratio: 5.8:1 

In South Korea, where aggressive testing has led to a near-total disappearance of new cases, the inflection point where the number of new daily cases plateaued was reached when the ratio of tests to new cases found reached 15:1. Any ratio less than that suggests that not enough testing is being done. Yesterday’s ratio of 5.8:1 is poor. We remain way behind in the number of tests we are administering.

Number of States (+DC and Puerto Rico) in total lockdown, business lockdown, and partial restrictions

• Total lockdown (personal + business): 23 (CA, CO, CT, DE, HI, ID, IL, IN, LA, MN, NH, NM, MI, MT, NJ, NY, OH, OR, PR, VT, WA, WI, WV)
• Business lockdown: 7 (DC, KY, MA, MD, ME*, NV, PA*)
• Partial restrictions on business (restaurants and bars): 15 (AL, FL*, GA*, IA, MO, MS,  NC*, ND, RI, SC*, TN*, TX*, UT*, VA, WY) 
• School closure only: 6 (AK, AZ**, AR, KS, OK**, SD)  
• No mandatory restrictions: 1 (NE*) 

*some local areas are under lockdowns

**some local areas with partial restrictions

With the exception of Arizona, all of the remaining States with no restrictions or only school closures are rural.

Number and percent of US population in total lockdown, business lockdown, and partial restrictions

• ***Total lockdown: 141.1 million, 42.5%
• ***Business lockdown: 39.2 million, 11.8%
• Partial restrictions on business (bars, restaurants): 114.9 million, 34.6% 
• School closure only: 16.4 million, 4.9%
• No mandatory restrictions: 1.9 million, 0.6%

Earlier this week, there was a decisive move towards more restrictive measures across the board. This has all but ground to a halt across the southern “red” States. Continued exponential growth in those cases will teach a brutal lesson.

As of yesterday, including metro areas in some States, over half of the total US population is under total lockdown. That is the percentage, AT MINIMUM, I think we need to have a chance of following China’s successful strategy for beating back the pandemic. The deceleration of the rate of increase in new cases may be the first signs that “social distancing” is bearing some fruit - but it is only lowering the exponential rate of growth to about 25% so far - far short of what is necessary.  The rate of testing, while improving, remains abysmally too low compared with the spread of the virus.

There is NO HOPE that the federal government under Trump will take necessary steps. Therefore those States which have gone to lockdowns need to cooperate regionally in quarantining incoming visitors at airports, train stations and at highway checkpoints.

Notes on the economy and coronavirus issues

 - by New Deal democrat

As is obvious, I have stopped reporting on almost all incoming economic data, as anything older than last week is out of date. But once the last important February data is reported tomorrow, I will take one last fond look back at our pre- Coronavirus Recession economy. How close to recession was it? 

I also want to write a few more detailed posts on several points. But for now, let me leave a quick note about some important issues going forward.

1. The federal government under Donald Trump is NEVER going to do what is necessary to bring this pandemic under control. Success is only going to be achieved by cooperative action by the States.

2. As I forecast, the increasing urgency of the pandemic has put the States under enormous public pressure to take more effective action. Most, especially the “blue” States and some Eastern, Midwestern, and a few Mountain West “red” States have done so. But Southern “red” States in particular continue to resist, and probably will continue to do so until it is too late - although ultimately they too will respond to pressures from their publics.

3. Now that there are essentially two regions of the country under lockdowns: (1) Northeast + upper Midwest and  (2) West Coast + upper Mountain States + New Mexico + Colorado, they need to cooperate to test and quarantine incoming visitors. This will require closing down their airports, seaports, and train stations to passenger traffic, or alternatively quarantining those arrivals for 14 days. Highway checkpoints also need to be set up at the borders of the regions, with similar restrictions. This is the only way to prevent carriers of the virus from recalcitrant States from undercutting the efforts of States in lockdown.

4. There is a fair amount of support among the Young Invulnerables for a modified “let ‘er rip” scenario. The idea is to let younger people go back to work, and just lock down older people and those with heightened risk. It wouldn’t work, for two reasons: (1) about 2% of the younger population will need intensive medical intervention, and even that will outstrip the US’s ICU capacity, even without accounting for infections among the more at risk plus unrelated needs; and (2) there is no way that younger people are going to stay away from those above the age cutoff for months at a time. So the age-dated “cordon sanitaire” would leak like a sieve. 

5. I do not think the federal government can continue to pass $Trillions in business stimulus indefinitely until the pandemic is brought under control. I believe that ***debt relief*** will be a far more effective and less costly method. Essentially, everybody gets a debt holiday through, say, June 30 (i.e., you don’t have to pay your mortgage, rent, or car or student loan payment). The missing payments are added on at the end of the existing term of the loan. Ultimately almost all creditors will wind up being banks, and the FDIC and the Fed, with the assistance of Congress, can step in to make sure they stay liquid and their depositors get interest payments. I need to flesh this out a lot more, but the above is the essence of the idea.

Coronavirus dashboard for March 26: southern “red” States resist effective measures

 - by New Deal democrat

Here is the update through yesterday (March 25) 

In order to succeed in containing the pandemic, I believe that the US needs at least 2 weeks of China (nearly complete lockdown) followed by at least a month of South Korea (very aggressive and widespread testing). 

At minimum, that means at least 50% of the US population under lockdown and a ratio of 15:1 in tests to results showing infection. The recent exponential growth of about 35% per day must be stopped. Those three most important metrics are starred (***) below. 

Yesterday we crossed two out of three of those thresholds - just over 50% of the population is under lockdown or near lockdown, and the rate of increase in new infections decelerated substantially. The amount of testing continues to fall are short of what is necessary.

Number and rate of increase of Reported Infections (from Johns Hopkins via arcgis.com)

• Number: up +13,972 to 69,197 (vs. +11,705 on March 25)
• ***Rate of increase: day/day: 25% (vs. 34.6% baseline and vs. 19% on March 24)

I am using Jim Bianco’s excellent exponential projection of 34.5% growth from March 10 as my baseline. It appears that “social distancing” strategies as well as State-mandated partial and total lockdowns may have begun to put a dent in this, as yesterday’s +25% and Tuesday’s+19% have been 2 of the 3 lowest rates of increase in the past two+ weeks.

Number and rate of increase of testing and deaths(from COVID Tracking Project)

• Number: 74,082, down  vs. 65,840 on March 25 day/day
• Rate: increase of 13% vs. number of tests previous day
• Deaths: 887 total, up +212, or +31% day/day

Comparison of rates of increase in documented infections vs. testing  

• Infections +25% vs. Tests +13% day/day

Result: The rate of testing is failing to improve and is far, far below what is needed, which is probably now at least 150,000/day.
Deaths lag infections by about 2 weeks, and are still growing at a far higher exponential rate for now.

Ratio of tests to positives for infection (from COVID Tracking Project)

• Number: 65,105 new tests vs. 9,806 new diagnosed infections 
• ***Ratio: 6.6:1 

In South Korea, where aggressive testing has led to a near-total disappearance of new cases, the inflection point where the number of new daily cases plateaued was reached when the ratio of tests to new cases found reached 15:1. Any ratio less than that suggests that not enough testing is being done. Yesterday’s ratio of 6.6:1 is poor. We remain way behind in the number of tests we are administering.

Number of States (+DC and Puerto Rico) in total lockdown, business lockdown, and partial restrictions

• Total lockdown (personal + business): 21 (CA, CO, CT, DE, HI, ID, IL, IN, LA, MN, NM, MI, NJ, NY, OH, OR, PR, VT, WA, WI, WV)
• Business lockdown: 7 (DC, KY, MA, MD, ME*, NV, PA*)
• Partial restrictions on business (restaurants and bars): 17 (AL, FL*, GA*, IA, MO, MS, MT, NH, NC*, ND, RI, SC*, TN*, TX*, UT*, VA, WY) 
• School closure only: 6 (AK, AZ, AR, KS, OK, SD)  
• No mandatory restrictions: 1 (NE*) 

*some local areas are under lockdowns

With the exception of Arizona, all of the remaining States with no restrictions or only school closures are rural.

Number and percent of US population in total lockdown, business lockdown, and partial restrictions

• ***Total lockdown: 138.6 million, 47.3%
• ***Business lockdown: 39.2 million, 11.8%
• Partial restrictions on business (bars, restaurants): 117.4 million, 35.4% 
• School closure only: 16.4 million, 4.9%
• No mandatory restrictions: 1.9 million, 0.6%

Earlier this week, there was a decisive move towards more restrictive measures across the board. This has all but ground to a halt across the southern “red” States. Continued exponential growth in those States will teach a brutal lesson.

As of yesterday, including metro areas in some States, over half of the total US population is under total lockdown. That is the percentage, AT MINIMUM, I think we need to have a chance of following China’s successful strategy for beating back the pandemic. The deceleration of the rate of increase in new cases may be the first signs that “social distancing” is bearing some fruit. The rate of testing, however, remains abysmally too low compared with the spread of the virus.

There is NO HOPE that the federal government under Trump will take necessary measures. Therefore those States which have gone to lockdowns need to cooperate regionally in quarantining incoming visitors at airports, train stations and at highway checkpoints.

Director-General of the WHO remarks favorably on a first China, then South Korea approach

 - by New Deal democrat

Tedious Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the Director-General of the World Health Organization, tweeted the following about the way that Suppression/lockdown regimes must work to be successful:

In summary, to be effective, a relatively short period of total lockdown needs to be used to ramp up testing, tracing, and quarantining. Once that is accomplished, and re-transmission of the virus is brought down to lower levels, then a South Korea-style regimen that allows the general lockdown to end can be implemented.

Obama Medicare Chief, Senior pandemic researcher add support for first China, then South Korea plan

 - by New Deal democrat

In the last 24 hours, I’ve read more support from experts for the plan that we need at least a short period of China (total lockdown) followed by an extended period of South Korea (massive testing + quarantining of the infected).

Here is Andy Slavitt, the Medicare, Medicaid, and ACA Chief under President Obama:

The biggest problem, aside from the fact that there is no nationwide shutdown at present, is the massive shortage of available testing:

And here is Jeremy Konyndyk, a senior policy fellow at the Center for Global Development, whose research focuses on humanitarian response, USAID policy reform, and global outbreak preparedness:

The plan we should be following is pretty clear.

It is also abundantly clear that the federal government under Trump is not going to follow this plan. Therefore it is up to a critical mass of States and governors, and Congress if they can muster a veto-proof majority, to implement it.