Fun with MA COVID-19 reporting 03-Sep-2020

Mistakes are sometimes amusing... The weekly report for August 19 indicated that there had been 0 new cases in Holliston in the preceding 2 weeks... however... if you look at the total count of cases, on August 5 there were 63, on August 12 there were 64 and on August 19 there were 65... so... yeah... that sounds like 2 to me rather than 0. Again, these things should be formulated by spreadsheet and it it shouldn't be prone to human error and... well... yeah.

Also, remember how yesterday I had said we had made some progress in the preceding month but not enough and how that included reduction in headcount in hospitals, ICUs in particular, and people intubated? Well... just to demonstrate how any given day's good news tends to be dampened shortly thereafter:
  • 1-month reduction as of yesterday for hospital headcount was 92 and today it is 63 (in part because a month ago we had a good day and in part because the headcount grew)
  • 1-month reduction as of yesterday of ICU headcount was 10 and today it's 3 (yay progress?)
  • 1-month reduction as of yesterday of intubations was 4 and today it's negative 4 (ie, the change in the last month is now that we increased intubation count rather than reduced it)
Admittedly, we have seen a reduction of hospitals using surge capacity but, again, I would point out that we've been bouncing around, mostly between 2 and 4 for the last 2 months (yes, really 2 MONTHS of no progress here), and we've now reduced once again to 2...

And all of this while changing from having seen 422 deaths in the preceding month to having seen 429.
Daily news of improved situations may be exciting but we should not forget that we've been here for 2 months and we've stopped making actual progress and, in some ways (such as number of new daily cases) are losing ground. It is by forgetting this and by not recognizing the truth of our situation that we lose sight of why we need to keep up the fight to limit COVID-19's opportunities to spread and think to ourselves that it's ok to engage in the more risky behaviors our Governor and President want us to.

Stay safe. Stay sane. Stay informed. Stay able to remember more than the daily headline.

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