Pandemic news, well, new pandemic news, was hard to come by this morning. As you might expect, the focus is on Ukraine and its defense against Russian aggression. The Professor has a couple of coworkers who are Russian. One has made it quite clear that he supports Putin's undertaking. Fortunately, these are not people with whom The Professor interacts on a daily basis.
We are nearing the second anniversary of WHO's official pronouncement of a pandemic on March 11, 2020. Those two years sometimes seem to have flown by, while other times they seem to have taken forever. I wonder whether WHO will offer some official announcement when it decides the pandemic has passed. On to current news...
Covid hospitalizations in the US are at about the lowest point of the past year. The US currently averages 55,701 new cases daily; 41,014 covid patients are in hospitals, a 23 percent drop from last week. That is about one-fourth of the mid-January peak and lower than it's been for most of the last year. Love it or leave it, it's easy to see why restrictions are being loosened or disappearing.
The covid numbers in Hong Kong are surging probably more than our numbers are dropping. The healthcare system is on the verge of breaking down; beds have been moved outdoors because there is no room inside. Whatever number is reported, it is likely to be a significant undercount. People are not reporting positive tests to avoid being placed in government isolation facilities. For the week ending on March 3, Hong Kong reported more deaths per million than any other country or territory. A major problem is that though 78 percent of the population ages 12 and older are fully vaccinated, only 48 percent of people ages 70 and older are. At the start of this year, only 25 percent of people over the age of 80 had been vaccinated.
Three truck convoys should be arriving in Washington, DC this weekend. The "People's Convoy" from California should arrive today. The "American Freedom Convoy" from the Midwest should arrive on Monday. Somewhere in between is a convoy that started in the Northeast. I have not read what their plans may include, things such as blocking the streets leading to the Capitol or White House. I wonder if they have thought about simply blocking traffic around the Beltway. It's hard to imagine just how much trouble that might cause.
The Professor and I could not resist watching Contagion last night. The virus there seemed to have a much more rapid onset and progression. Some of the mob-like scenes seemed over-the-top, but then my view of what was going on in Italy or New York City in the pandemic's first days was whatever the news media provided. The movie seemed to totally bypass any clinical testing and approval of vaccines. To say more would be a spoiler. It wasn't a bad movie. It definitely made me think about what this has been like for the scientific first-responders, the epidemiologists and virologists under pressure to provide answers immediately if not before. I think we'll look for something a little more lighthearted if we decide tonight is another movie night.
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