Hoosier

We have started to pretty consistently get around/under 10% positive test rate in Indiana for the past several days.

Stuff like that is probably going on everywhere. The question is how many people are inappropriately designated as dying from covid and then on the other side, how many covid deaths have slipped through the cracks? (especially earlier on). For all the questions about the way the US is counting deaths, it looks f*cking fantastic compared to how some other countries are counting.

Somembody who was at a church service of 180 people tested positive https://sacramento.cbslocal.com/2020/05/15/butte-county-mothers-day-service-coronavirus-contact-tracing/ In some ways this could be informative but there are a number of unknowns, like how many people were wearing masks and how far apart they were.

Some of the Indiana restaurants that are closing https://www.theindychannel.com/news/coronavirus/covid-19-economic-impact/indianapolis-restaurants-and-businesses-permanently-closed-due-to-covid-19

The southeast MI one is unbelievable when you consider climo for that area.

From what I understand, they picked from all across the state. But it would be reasonable to think that the most populated areas of the state (like Indianapolis and Lake county) have had higher than 2.8% exposure.

So based on those numbers above and where the death toll stood on May 1, here is what a near worst case scenario for Indiana could look like. I say near because it assumes basically everything goes wrong on the treatment/vaccine front but does NOT assume the hospitals get overloaded at any point, resulting in excess mortality rates. Let's say 70% of the state gets infected before an effective vaccine or a really good therapeutic that knocks down the death rate in a major way. That could result in nearly 30,000 deaths, unless the high risk population can be protected a lot better than they have been up to this point. Let's hope it doesn't get to that point. There is a lot of work being done on the treatment and vaccine front, so have to be cautiously optimistic that something will come along.

Indiana is doing antibody sampling, similar to what New York and some other areas have done. Preliminary results: 2.8% of the state's population, or 186,000 people, have or had the virus as of May 1. The confirmed number of cases as of May 1 suggests that only about 1 in 11 infections were being identified. The state's fatality rate comes out to 0.58%, which is in the general ballpark of what other similar antibody testing has suggested elsewhere. About 45% of infected individuals never had symptoms. The good news in all of this is that the spread was slowed dramatically by the measures that were taken, as our antibody results are well below what was observed in New York. The bad news is that we have a long way to go, assuming it is true that about 97% of the state's population has not been exposed. And I suspect the truly rural states (Indiana is not Wyoming) have had even less exposure. https://www.wishtv.com/news/medical/study-estimates-186000-hoosiers-had-covid-19-or-antibodies-by-may/

I gained a few since then and am 195 lbs (at 5'11"). I'm gonna tell myself that it's all muscle gain.

Now there are questions about the Abbott rapid result test. Potentially far too high false negative rate.

I have never been as happy to have a pair of adjustable weights for home use... they are those block things that can adjust to over 100 lbs each. Easy to dedicate yourself to working out when so many places are closed lol. I heard some people have been jacking up the prices of those things.

Saw a study came out that found lower transmission rate in hotter weather. I think it's obvious at this point that we will be dealing with this in a significant way throughout the summer, even if transmission is lower than we've seen so far. The extent of a summer dropoff won't be nearly like it is with the flu.

Ugly death count in IL. I think it might be their highest daily number yet but someone from there would probably know better.

Looks like there could be some junk lingering through late morning if not into the afternoon around here. But there is a nice reservoir of relatively steep mid level lapse rates advecting in during the afternoon/evening so I am less concerned about the lingering junk than I otherwise would be. Overall setup appears to have potential to evolve into a respectable damaging wind event with time.

Well this will be interesting. If you want to dine-in at a restaurant in Washington state, you will have to provide your contact info so they can reach you for contact tracing in the event that someone ends up getting sick. I have a feeling we are not going to see that policy in many red states. Just a hunch. https://www.seattletimes.com/life/food-drink/to-reopen-washington-state-restaurants-will-have-to-keep-log-of-customers-to-aid-in-contact-tracing/?fbclid=IwAR0XczlZRtJkXhb5l_EtwY1JDZMZHQzRxtZeamndkfAdEtFQyuVBeoNEToU

That's pretty good. I don't think IN has run more than about 6k-7k in a day (most days lower) and we have half your population.

Cook county always puts up big numbers of course, but it looks like the Rockford area shot up a lot percentage wise.

Saw a graph showing dine-in attendance at restaurants in some southern states that have reopened. The numbers are way down, even accounting for the capacity limits that are in place. Going to be important to thrive on takeout and outdoor seating, which obviously not all will be able to do.

Speaking of that, I may never go to the barber again lol. Have cut my own hair a couple times since this started and did a pretty good job if I must say so myself. Barber does cut it quicker but I think I would get more time efficient with continued practice.

Anecdote time but my aunt told me she witnessed an elderly woman with a cane being heckled for wearing a mask inside of a store. I mean really? That is the type of person who should be more concerned about this virus. Why is a mask triggering people?

So Lake county IN begins phased reopening tomorrow... joining most of the rest of IN which began last Monday. Still another week until restaurants can open for dine-in at reduced capacity here, but most of IN can start dine-in at reduced capacity tomorrow. City of Gary has a stay at home order until May 15, but let's be honest, it is not really enforced. There is not much to stop a Gary resident from traveling to a neighboring town to do something that they can't do in Gary. I have read a few stories from around Indiana about people being pulled over for a DUI or whatever and then having the stay at home violation tacked on, but that is more of an incidental thing as it's not the original reason for being stopped. Hope things turn out well. Based on what I have read in other states that have begun reopening, there are some businesses that are choosing not to reopen even though they can. Wonder if I will see the same thing around here.

Definition of pandemic is an infectious disease that spreads across multiple continents or the world. Based on that, I'm not sure how this doesn't meet the definition. It started in China and spread across much of the world. You could maybe argue that the seasonal flu is "pandemic", but generally it's not considered to be as it tends to appear simultaneously across regions and not originate in one place and spread out.

I have been monitoring my county's dashboard of cases and there are now only a couple towns without any deaths... and they are the least populated/rural ones (one has a couple thousand residents and the other only has a couple hundred residents). Even those towns have a few cases though. Not surprisingly, about 98% of cases are in the more populated northern half of the county as much of the southern 1/2 is rural.

Roy from Siegfried and Roy died.

Plan to reopen Chicago https://abc7chicago.com/coronavirus-chicago-reopening-plan-restore-illinois-protecting/6162864/