Wednesday, January 06, 2021

CoViD-19: San Diego Reaches 53.4 Cases Per 100k; Reports 32 B.1.1.7. Patients | New Dem-Majority Board Will Rescind All "Nonsense" | Dems Projected To Take GA Seats | |

Hummingbird Pollinator of Africa Rocks at San Diego Zoo (Taken 10.20.2019)

It was really hard to leave the house today. I had a headache from my indulgent wine consumption on Monday and I wear pajamas like they're a uniform, but I felt like we had to do a Costco run before Wednesday and the bonkers election certification that's going to go down, plus potential madness from the Georgia senate runoffs (which at the moment appear to be going to the democrats.) It almost feels like I can breathe again. But not before all the crazy shit goes down first. Somehow I'm on Roger Stone's email list (which goes straight to spam) but this time I read it and DC could be insane tomorrow and who knows if that will fan out across the country. So anyway, we've got ourselves some rations to get us through till inauguration day if necessary and that also explains why this post is going out so late tonight. I recently realized I could have the CNN streaming on our Roku so I've been obsessed with these election results, but there's a ton of other news today, too, so check it all after the jump.

What I wanted to talk about was actually the San Diego County Board of Supervisors. In a conversation between Nathan Fletcher and Nora Vargas shared on Instagram, Fletcher said that they're going to rescind all previous letters to the Governor and public health officials that requested exemptions, adjudications, and other changes to the state health order and its restrictions. (I transcribed because I'm psycho)

"That's why I'm excited, Nora, to bring forward on Tuesday with you, a letter before the Board and if adopted...look, we just want to speak...at least the majority of the Board...speak with a clear voice to say we trust science, we believe in public health orders that are there, we understand we cannot avoid the difficult decisions we have to make. They are difficult-- we don't wanna close anything, we don't want anyone's businesses negatively impacted--but we can't avoid that, and the economic damage would be far greater" 

"We want to at least get us on record that this is the approach of the County of San Diego as it relates to COVID, and we're gonna work with the state, we're gonna rescind all of the previous letters and stuff we did against the State of California, and at least aimed out the majority of the Board speak with a clear voice." 

"As funding allocations are made around COVID, they've gotta recognize the proportionality of who's been hit hardest. You can't just take a pandemic that has hit certain communities at 2 or 3 or 4 times the rate, and give everyone equal response. And so laying out as a County, look, we're rescinding all that nonsense we did last year, attacking the Governor and attacking public health orders, we're gonna prioritize our funding to meet the need based on data and health equity, we're going to work collaboratively instead of antagonistically with the state, and reaffirming we're going to rely on data and science to drive decision-making."

"As my colleague on the COVID subcommittee, (we'll be) bringing forward a letter overriding previous board actions and statements that contradict having a response based on data and science, prioritizing future funding based on data-driven approach to targeted communities in need, taking into account health equity, working collaboratively instead of antagonistically with the state, and reaffirm our county is going to rely on data, science decision-making to keep us safe."


  • COVID-19:
    • FDA Statement on Following the Authorized Dosing Schedules for COVID-19 Vaccines - FDA (1.4.2021)
      We have been following the discussions and news reports about reducing the number of doses, extending the length of time between doses, changing the dose (half-dose), or mixing and matching vaccines in order to immunize more people against COVID-19. These are all reasonable questions to consider and evaluate in clinical trials. However, at this time, suggesting changes to the FDA-authorized dosing or schedules of these vaccines is premature and not rooted solidly in the available evidence. Without appropriate data supporting such changes in vaccine administration, we run a significant risk of placing public health at risk, undermining the historic vaccination efforts to protect the population from COVID-19.
    • Congress using Covid test that FDA warns may be faulty. The Office of the Attending Physician has been offering the test, made by Curative, to members, staff and reporters on Capitol Hill since at least November. - Politico (1.4.2021)
    • Coronavirus: South Africa strain ‘more of a problem’ than UK variant, says British health secretary. The South African variant is driving a surge of infections in the country, and like the UK strain, it appears to be more infectious than previous mutations. Still, there is no evidence yet that the Covid-19 vaccines approved so far will not work against the new strains. - South China Morning Post (1.5.2021)
    • The US surpassed 325,000 cumulative deaths on December 23 and 350,000 deaths on January 4. The 9 days to increase from 300,000 to 325,000 deaths matched the rate at the peak of the initial surge in March. Notably, the 12 days between 325,000 and 350,000 included 2 major holiday weekends, which likely delayed reporting to some extent. From the first US death, it took 55 days to reach 50,000 deaths. From there: 50k to 100k- 33 days; 100k to 150k- 63 days; 150k to 200k- 55 days; 200k to 250k- 58 days, 250k to 300k- 25 days; 300k to 350k- 20 days - Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security
  • Politics/News:
  • Global COVID-19 Stats (JHU 1/5 11:22pm):
    • 86,423,758 Known Cases
    • 1,869,153 Known Deaths
  • US COVID-19 Stats 
    • (JHU)
      • 21,050,708 Cases
      • 357,377 Deaths
    • (COVID Tracking Project):
      • 214,378 New Cases/20,825,758 Known Cases (+7.8% Change over 7 Days)
      • 3,478 New Deaths/348,286 Known Deaths
      • 131,195 Current COVID-19 Hospitalizations
      • 23,509 Currently COVID-19 patients in ICU
      • 7,976 COVID-19 patients currently on ventilator
  • California COVID-19 Stats:
    • Aggregate California ICU Bed Availability: 0%
    • 31,440 New Cases/2,452,334 Total Cases (+1.3% increase)
    • 368 New Deaths/27,003 Total Deaths (+1.4% increase)
    • 12.7% 14-day test positivity rate
    • 22,485 COVID-19 Hospitalizations (+482 patients, +2.1% from prior day)
    • 4,734 COVID-19 ICU hospitalized in CA (+63 patients, +1.3%  from prior day)
    • 1,319 ICU beds available (-18 from prior day)
  • San Diego County 
    • Free Testing Sites and Schedule in San Diego
    • State Data:
      • Southern California ICU Bed Availability: 0%
      • 3,013 New Cases/171,031 Total Cases (+1.8%)
      • 6 Deaths/1,598 Total Deaths (+0.4%)
      • 65.9 cases/100k population (Assessed on 1/5. Unadjusted Case Rate)
      • 13.3% Test Positivity (Assessed on 1/5)
      • 19.0% Health Equity Positivity (Assessed on 1/5)
      • 1,585 COVID-19 hospitalized patients (+26 patients, +1.7% from prior day)
      • 387 COVID-19 ICU hospitalized patients (+10 patients, +2.7% from prior day)
      • 202 ICU beds available (+13 from prior day)
    • County Data:
      • County Adds 56 New COVID-19 Deaths as New Virus Strain Spreads - County News Center 
      • 32 COVID-19 Variant Cases Identified in San Diego County - County News Center
        • New cases have been identified in San Diego, Chula Vista, La Mesa, and Lakeside.  The cases are among multiple age groups. While the four youngest cases are under 10 and the oldest is over 70, the average age of the variant cases to date is 36, the same as the overall average for all confirmed cases in the county to date.
      • San Diego County COVID-19 Watch
        • 9,789 people interviewed in last two weeks
        • 5,549 claim no potential community exposure
      • 1,814 New Cases/172,847 Total Cases 
      • 56 New Daily Deaths/1,654 Total Deaths
      • 9% Daily Test Positivity/14.8% (7-day avg after 7-day lag)/12.9% Test Positivity (14-day average)
      • 53.4 cases/100k population (Assessed on 1/5. Adjusted case rate per 100,000 excluding prisons.) 
      • 39% Case Investigation (under 70% goal)
      • 1% Increasing Day Over Day COVID-19 Hospitalizations (1,564 patients. 91% increase over 30 days)
      • 20% ICU Capacity (+374 patients. 69% increase over 30 days)
      • 1,609 COVID Patients/4,468 Total Patients/4,762 Total Capacity
      • 606 COVID & Suspect ICU/762 Capacity 
      • 2 New/ 44 Community Outbreaks (7-day)
        • Business 17
        • Retail 1
        • Grocery 2
        • Faith-based Setting 3
        • Daycare/preschool 6
        • Healthcare 4
        • Emergency Services 3
        • Food/Bev Processing 2
        • tk-12 school 2
        • Warehouse/Distribution 1
        • Hotel/Resort/Spa 3

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