In The Shadow Of Mt Hollywood

I'm continuing to look at the COVID trends for individual US states, because it's plain that the claims of people like Drs Fauci and Walensky that there is a "national" surge in cases are highly misleading. Any national increase is actually driven by a minority of states whose patterns don't reflect those of most others. Michigan's case, shown above, is a good example. CNN reports Michigan reported 8,413 new Covid-19 cases on Saturday, bringing the state's total pandemic case count to 692,206, according to the state's health department. Saturday's daily case count is the highest the state has reported since December 7, when the reported case count was 9,350, state statistics show. Just eight weeks ago, state data showed the daily reported case count was as low as 563 cases. Michael Osterholm, director of the University of Minnesota Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy, said the Upper Midwest is beginning to see its fourt...

I must confess that, with a surname like Bruce, I have some Scots DNA, though it comes from a single great-grandfather who seems to have been an unpleasant guy who died young. Generally I don't take to that side of the family. But I once knew a Scots-Canadian professor who was extremely fond of a story about a Scotsman who would persuade himself to eat his oatmeal by promising himself that if he did, he could have shot of whiskey when he finished it. But once he finished the oatmeal, he'd tell himself, "Ha! I fooled ya!" He told this story so frequently, and with such loving attention to detail and accent, that I was convinced it reflected some deep part of his character, maybe Scots, maybe Canadian, maybe both. Anyhow, a Canadian visitor sent me a link to the Archdiocese of Vancouver, BC website that seems to reflect this side of what may be the Canadian character: As of March 29, all indoor worship has been suspended again. B.C. health officials...

While the Washington Examiner isn't quite legacy media, It's more Never Trump Republican, and I don't normally follow it. But yesterday I ran into a remarkably obtuse story on a supposed "new wave" of COVID by David Hogberg. Hogberg, I see, is a regular talking head and adjunct-freelance-whatever with a PhD in PoliSci. I spend about three hours a day writing and researching this blog, and I don't get paid a penny. I assume Hogberg supports himself with his variouis gigs and has convinced people he's an expert, with his PhD and all. But as a retired amateur, I'm a far better writer and researcher than Hogberg. Here's what he has to say about the current state of COVID play: The bad news is that the United States appears to be on the cusp of another wave of coronavirus infections. The good news is that hospitalizations and deaths may be much lower this time around. Daily confirmed cases had been dropping since January, when they reached a...

My own takeaway from yesterday's post is that, faced with a COVID surge as bad as has taken place anywhere, California somehow turned things around in a way that few other jurisdictions have. The question of why has been pestering me for some time. I was originally gonig to post on some Canadian craziness that a visitor sent me, but I found a discussion in an LA County health department press release we received in an e-mail that goes some distance to help me understand what's happened here. One direction my thinking had been taking was that, indeed, California vaccination policy had been aimed from the start at vaccinating the most vulnerable populations, where the outbreaks were most severe. My original sense was that this was just politcal correctness, but on reflection, while it was politically correct, it was also just good project strategy: fix the problem where it's both easiest and most visible. The press release indicates that this was in fact what the county did...

As of this week, LA County has qualified to leave the California "red" tier of COVID restrictions, and as of Monday, April 5, it will be placed in the less restrictive "orange" tier. From the time Gov Newsom imposed the multi-colored COVID tiers last August 28, LA County had been in the most restrictive "purple" tier. Its performance during the late 2020 surge had been a virtual Mt Everest on the chart, as shown above. But for reasons that aren't completely clear, the county's numbers began a precipitous drop in mid-January 2021 and, contravening trends in places like Germany, Canada, and the US northeast, have continued to plummet. The county left the "purple" tier, where it had been for over seven months, just on March 14, when it was placed in the "red" tier. However, it has blown through the "red" tier in the minimum time it was required to wait there, three weeks, and yesterday the state declared that it qualifi...

In a bizarre and weepy statement to the media yesterday, Dr Rochelle Walensky, head of the CDC, departed from her prepared statement and, close to tears, said I'm going to lose the script, and I'm going to reflect on the recurring feeling I have of impending doom. We have so much to look forward to so much promise and potential of where we are, and so much reason for hope. But right now I'm scared. The first reaction I had was that leaders don't break into panic in prepared public remarks. Instead, leaders, even when things look bleak, outline a positive course of action. Think we shall fight on the beaches. But in fact, she's outlining no course of action at all, and indeed no serious understanding of the particular problem. And of course, if she thinks a spike in COVID "cases" is "impending doom", what word does she use for ebola or bubonic plague? I'll get to the over-the-top below. Like Dr Fauci yesterday, she looks at a national t...

Yesterday on Sunday talk, Dr Fauci said US COVID-19 cases were rising again "because of infectious coronavirus variants, people traveling more, and states easing restrictions too soon." More than 11 states have eased restrictions, despite the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warning that "now is not the time." As far as I can tell, an uptick in US cases is due almost entirely to New York. Here's the New York chart: But here's California: New York's population is 18 million. California's population is 40 million. California's COVID statistics, with LA County a key factor, have actually been plummeting in recent weeks, as I noted here yesterday. But according to the New York Post, New York and New Jersey now have the highest rates of COVID-19 infection in the country. The Empire State has averaged 548 cases for every 100,000 residents over the past 14 days — only surpassed by the Garden State with 647 ...