The U.S. tops 1 million Covid infections in 24 hours

Bloomberg Markets
@markets
- 4 hours ago

BREAKING: The U.S. tops 1 million Covid infections in 24 hours, doubling the figure from just four days ago and setting a global record

Here is the link : https://trib.al/VUG5x0U

Jim / Scott,

What do you think about the COVD situation now and your prediction over the next few weeks?

Regards
James

Hi James,

The article has good information that largely speaks for itself. As someone who has to interpret tests results (and does some investing) false positives, sensitivity and specificity are important to me. The CDC is battling with this:

“…the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shortened the isolation period to five days for asymptomatic people who test positive for Covid-19, the agency may add that they should get a negative test result before venturing out again, officials said.”

I believe they are talking about the fast antigen test which has few false positives (specific but not sensitive).

The PCR test is TOO SENSITIVE for this use as it can give positive results for about 12 weeks after an infection (when I a person is not longer contagious) and the CDC has specifically said this should not be used for this purpose.

Anyway, the PCR test has been giving false positives and skewing some of the results all along. Loose discussion and poor understanding of the different tests in the media has led to some polarization that is purely due to not understanding the advantages and limitations of the tests or even knowing which test is being used (discussed). Some discussions (on all sides) intentionally confuses the issue.

Clinically, as a practical example, when I had Covid I tested positive with the fast antigen test. Since it is specific, I probably had active Covid (not a false positive) no further testing was needed. The physician would had given me the PCR test if the antigen test was negative. It is a more sensitive test. A negative PCR test will ensure that a person does not have Covid (with high confidence) and pick up some additional people who truly have Covid. At the cost of finding some people who do not have an active infection.

There are a lot of false positives for younger women getting mammograms which is one reason mammograms are no longer recommended for younger women without high-risk characteristics. So, this is something medicine (physicians, test companies and drug companies) deal with every day. Sensitivity, specifically and accuracy of results are important to the recent guilty-finding in the Elizabeth Holmes case.

Anyway, I hope I have not said anything political or overstated my abilities to predict what willl happen. I am looking at a Random Forest Classifier as we speak. Are my results a false positive? A serious question that could cost me (make me) money.

Best,

Jim

If virus and it’s variants turn out to be “just like a flu” then 1M is just fear mongering from news sources.

A quick search reveals that the regular flu in 2017 killed about 0.1% of the 41M infections.

These numbers are wrong. I posted the corrected stats below
From June 2021 till now Covid in the USA killed 1.5% of the infections. The previous wave, June 2020 - June 2021 it killed 2.3%. So it’s in the right direction, but still too high to just live normal! With vaccinations and omicron the number better go much, much lower. Are we at the inflection point ? Are vaccines really that effective? Let’s hope.

That’s what I’m watching

And in 2017 150M flu vaccines were given. Covid has 210M vaccinations, yet covid is still 15x more dangerous. So very troubling if downward trend does not pick up.

Edit: perhaps my post was not in full agreement. The Delta variant has a mortality rate (case mortality rate) of about 0.28% in New York according to one study that tested for antibodies as evidence of previous infection. It is unknown for Omicron. Source

Note: many sources are now hiding the results of this and not stating numbers for any studies. The WHO for example will not give a number (but they did when the numbers looked like they were higher). It is not immediately available on the CDC site either. I welcome any other references from peer reviewed studies. My references are limited, I am still searching this and they could be plain wrong as I post this. But it does look like better numbers should be more available but are generally harder to find.

Also even 0.28% IS HIGHER THAN THE FLU. I am not out to make a point. I will leave my original post for now as I am not sure that it is entirely wrong–especially with regard to the younger people going to Woodstock. But it is not a simple discussion and there are some things about Omicron that certainly I do not know.

Here is a serious discussion of the numbers (in general) with some (too?) early discussion about Omicron case mortality: Statisical data about Omicron

Marco,

I agree. I did not want to have too much of an opinion before. But perhaps members will forgive me if I post in agreement with an already well-reasoned post.

For perspective on flu, the flu in 1968 was very severe. Possibly as severe as the Omicron Variant and there was no oral medication at the time (like Paxlovid for Covid now).

America’s response regarding 6 foot distancing? Just look at old videos of Woodstock. Should they have cancelled Woodstock? Maybe they should have and maybe they would today. Certainly, Jimi Hendrix should have been wearing a mask :wink:

I do to have the final word on this. But it is not a one-sided debate where only one viewpoint is worth considering.

Thank you Marco,

Jim

Data from Europe and S Africa suggests Omnicron is less lethal than Delta, with some sources showing its reduction at approximately 80%. This may be due to prior immunity or because the virus is less likely to attack the lungs. It appears to be almost 2x as infectious as Delta, again from limited data. Recent papers have showed that vaccinated people clear Omnicron in 5.5 days vs unvaccinated clear it in 7.5 days which is why the CDC shortened the isolation period. There is data showing that PCR tests can be positive for up to 3 months as they pick up dead viral particles but the CDC has seen no evidence of infectiousness past 9 days in anyone that isn’t immunosuppressed. There is a paucity of data on how long the rapid antigen tests can be positive for but University of Chicago doesn’t retest for 3 months after a covid infection for the reason of above.

Jim / Scott,

In the last 10 days, 3.11M tested positive in US. That works out to about 1.6% of the total workforce. And no peak yet.

Virtually all of them will recover, but most will be prevented from working or going out (economic activity).

Same demand, less production = more inflation

Western Europe has consistent been about six weeks ahead of the US, and they also made a new record Monday and, for now, are not showing signs of peaking.

Regards
James



I made a bad mistake in my calculation where I said the last 6 months the mortality was 1.5% (I was using running totals, not period totals). It’s actually 1.01% , so seems to be dropping much faster.

I’m simply using numbers from the graphs in ​COVID Live - Coronavirus Statistics - Worldometer

The corrected numbers are
6.3% for wave 1 (feb 2020 - jun 2020)
1.5% for wave 2 (jun 2020 - jun 2021)
1.01% for wave 3 (jun 2021 - jan 2022)

1% is still very high. But If these numbers are not reliable (cases are actually 10x , mortality overstated, etc) then who knows what is going on


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Thank you Marco.

Marco,

I do not have numbers that I want to post. I am good with 1%, BTW.

Remember, especially with Omicron there is the claim that a lot of people have the disease but never have symptoms and probably never get tested. They clearly are cases.

The CDC and WHO are having problems with quantitating these people. I like the CDC and FDA despite any weakness. Probably things like this are the cause of any hesitancy to publish any numbers (not some conspiracy). I guess someone will have to look at this when they put the final numbers in the text books

Serious stuff no matter what the numbers are. And at a minimum any spike that stresses hospitals has to be addressed.

Thank you for the data.

Best,

Jim

The denominator of the number of cases is likely much higher which makes the mortality lower. This is because there is a large gap between the amount of covid detected in sewage (it’s 2-3x higher in sewage) relative to the amount of positive tests. This is because the US can test 2 million people a day and in a flare 25% are positive so it can only diagnose 500,000 infections per day (This is approximate) but Omnicron is spreading faster than this.

Jim / Scott,

Bloomberg UK
@BloombergUK 2 hours ago

JUST IN: U.K. reports 218,724 new daily Covid-19 cases, the first time the figure has topped 200,000

UK also reporting record daily high COVID cases just now.

Regards
James

I know several people who know they likely contracted it, but they can’t find rapid at home test and because their symptoms are not serious they’re not bothering to go to our local testing backlogged testing facilities and wait in line 1-2 hours.
I imagine we’re only picking up a small sample of cases.

I have family members who work at our local hospital in Florida. Our case rates now are going straight vertical, and it’s almost entirely Omicron because we had an absolutely brutal Delta wave previously in the summer/early fall and had phenomenally low rates in the months that followed until Omicron hit over the holidays. While were are seeing rises in “hospitalized” currently, it’s not the same kind of hospitalizations that we saw during Delta. During Delta we were seeing much hospitalizations with really severe COVID pneumonias that required ventilators and ICU stays. A lot of our hospitalized now are elderly (mostly vaccinated) who are just really uncomfortable/weak and dehydrated and need a 1 or 2 day stays hooked on an IV and observation before they are discharged. Almost all of our serious ICU/Ventilator cases are unvaccinated (fwiw just reporting what I hear, not trying to start a debate over it … I really respect that this community remains mostly apolitical and I don’t wish to disrupt that). That said, it sounds like the regions of the US that are simultaneously getting hit with Delta are still experiencing a lot of the same severity we saw over the summer during our Delta wave. Scary stuff.

Stay safe and best of health to everyone.

At one point I predicted there would be herd immunity soon. At the time it was commonly published that mutations similar to what we see with influenza recombinations were not possible (e.g., H1N1 becomes H1N3 or H2N1 in parts of the world where pigs and birds are in close proximity). Turns out–whatever was thought at the time–mutations are a problem.

I could try to blame it on the journals but I am here to say I was wrong. There will be no herd immunity, I think. Not what we have thought of as herd immunity, anyway. Maybe they will just redefine it.

This Journal of the American Medical Association link calls it the “zero Covid strategy.” I may be oversimplifying but I think he is saying that is dead. A National Strategy for the “New Normal” of Life With COVID

I am hesitant to link to this because I didn’t actually see anything actionable. But is refreshing to see people admit that strategy that they thought would work will not. Plain and simple.

Jim

Jim / Scott,

EU/US just too big (population) to peak without the world peaking.

So far, the world is not peaking.

Regards
James


Jim,

These European countries are seeing a second surge after it was said their Omicron wave peaked.

Regards
James





James, Thanks. -Jim

Hi James,

I’ve also been following the hospitalizations on this wave and they have decoupled from the number of infections relative to prior waves (less hospitalizations per infection this wave) however the sheer number of infections (which is greater than prior waves) could result in hospitalizations equaling or surpassing the prior waves.

Also as I mentioned previously we are significantly under reporting the number of infections

Scott

If I understand this correctly, in order to achieve herd immunity, we need to get the R0 (the rate of reproduction) under 1, which would mean that each person who gets it would pass it on to less than one other person on average.

There are indications that natural immunity (unlike vaccines), lasts. This could make herd immunity achievable.

We should also be seriously considering redesigning ventilation for buildings. This is especially important for super spreader venues where there are travelers plus prolonged close indoor contact such as bars and special events.

I would be careful about confusing rate of infection, R0, with herd immunity. They aren’t the same. At several times the R0 has dropped below 1. That’s what in fact happens when cases decrease which you know we have observed several times.

Perhaps, although there is much documented evidence of reinfection of those with prior infections and even more so with Omicron, albeit Omicron does appear milder. Vaccines are maintaining a level of immunity which does decrease over time, but the data is also showing the same for natural immunity. This is consistent with experience with common colds many which are caused by a few coronaviruses. Yet the average American gets 2-3 colds a year. One thing to consider with the flu or cold is that herd immunity is never really achieved but perhaps these diseases are less severe because we are constantly exposed to them throughout our lives. These diseases have also adapted to the human host. Typically as diseases adapt to a host they do become less deadly over time but this is a gradual and random process in the short term.

Totally agree. Although I think over the coming months we will reach a collective exhaustion of COVID and won’t care about the risk. The stock market no longer cares and has moved on.

Scott,

When I read the article I linked to above I had not realized that Ezekiel Emanuel had coauthored it. As you probably know, he played a big part in the writing of the affordable care act. He doesn’t just write editorials. He shapes policy.

Also I think it is no coincidence that he is writing this as Omicron is becoming the predominant strain. He probably has an opinion as to the the ability to achieve zero Omicron as well as early results on the case fatality rate for this strain.

The article speaks for itself without adding my predictions about Omicron. But without a lot of surprises one can expect this kind of thinking to shape policy going forward. Certainly in things like insurance coverage, vaccine regulations etc. I am sure that people in the Biden administration have at least read this–as well as longer policy recommendations from him and his coworkers. I think it is already backed into the cake (barring any surprises). Ezekiel Emanuel has an influence on, or even direct control of, the policies we will see: not an endorsement of, or comment on, the affordable care act.

Best,

Jim