CoVID-19: P1 Variant Outbreak In Canada Interrupts NHL | California On The Cusp of 4M Doses To Lowest HPI Quartile | Happy 51 Year Anniversary, Mom & Dad! |

Vaccinated and Celebrating 51 Years Together (Taken 4.4.21)

We spent Easter Sunday at my parents' house for their 51st wedding anniversary where my sisters and mom had made a brunch feast of pancakes, eggs, bacon, ham, potato salad, fruit salad, chipotle pasta salad, macaroni salad, deviled eggs, and all kinds of other delights. It was super nice to hang out and watch the Padres game with my dad, as he dozed in and out and I was puppy mauled by Roxy who tried to lick my face off. It was a chill time and so nice because all of the adults amongst us are at least partially vaccinated. None of us are really out in the world, but it is still amazingly unburdening knowing we're all mostly protected. And I know it would be ineffective, but Nova is getting mandatory testing for her school tomorrow, and we'll probably do another test at the end of the week just to be doubly sure. 

California is only 71,387 doses away from hitting the 4 million doses to the HPI first quartile which will adjust the metrics for the tier system, putting counties with three weeks with less than 5.9 cases/100k into the Orange Tier. From Saturday to Sunday, 80,132 doses were administered in this quartile, so counting today will probably put us there unless a significant amount of vaccination centers closed for Easter. Either way, San Diego should be Orange by the time of the next assessment (Tuesday) which I think goes into effect within 24 hours. 

I was trying not to delve too deep into news today, but I noticed a post about the Vancouver Canucks NHL team which led to a deeper dive into the P1 Variant and how widespread it is across Canada and then the science of why hockey rinks are especially dangerous with the aerosolized virus and it kinda got me a little panicked. I feel like the County and State have been pretty good about getting information out through their media briefings, but if I had my shot at a question this week, it would be how many test samples are being sequenced in the county and in the state and what is the rate of growth they're seeing. Santa Clara county is panicking. The R-effective is growing locally and statewide. The holiday is going to throw off numbers so ours are looking really good (1% positivity, 193 new cases,) but as things open up we could certainly see some backsliding. I was getting fine with the idea of Nova going back to school, especially because it's only going to end up being 8 total days in two months, but I'll definitely be watching closely. As vaccinated people, so long as we have an unvaccinated kid in the house, we can maybe relax our shoulders but not our habits and diligence. Stay safe out there. 

• COVID-19:
• My family sacrificed to fight covid. Many Americans didn’t. Now my mom is dead. We did our part. But our leaders failed to push others to do the same. - The Washington Post (4.2.21)
• The Final Insult: Some Dying of COVID-19 While Awaiting Vaccine. Air Force veteran Diane Drewes spent months hoping to receive a COVID-19 immunization -  NBC San Diego (4.3.21)
  More than 247,000* people have died of COVID-19 in the U.S. since vaccines first became available mid-December.
  (*data sources vary. By my record of the Covid Tracking Project from Dec 14 to today's CDC number, 261,277 Americans have died)
• Infectious Disease Expert Warns Of New COVID-19 Wave Infecting Younger People. “We’re almost in a new pandemic,” said Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy. - HuffPo (4.4.21)
  “There isn’t a country in the world right now that has seen a big increase of this B117 that is not locking down. We’re the exception. And so the bottom line message from all of these countries is, we could not control this virus until we did lockdown. We have to do a better job of helping the public understand that this is short term. All we’re trying to do is get through this surge of cases that are going to occur over the next six to eight to 10 weeks because of this B117 variant.”
• Pandemic poised to surge again in California's Silicon Valley tech hub - Reuters (4.1.21)
• Spread of Variants: Dr. Eric Feigl-Ding has been writing about the P1 outbreak in Vancouver and across Canada, and each Twitter thread he writes spins off and references 3 other threads (because he loves to self congratulate and say he warned us all, like, all the time, but he's not wrong...so this concern is valid. 
• More than half of Vancouver Canucks' players test positive for COVID-19, source says - ESPN (4.4.21)
  ... the more infectious P.1 variant of COVID-19...has been found among several of the cases affecting the Canucks...The Vancouver region has recently become a hotspot for the P.1 variant.
• Canucks pause season as 'scary' COVID-19 outbreak extends to more than 20 players, coaches - Yahoo! Sports (4.3.21)
• Increased Risk of COVID-19 Transmission in Indoor Ice Rinks - Yale School Of Public Health, Research & Practice (2.8.21)
• Poor air quality and movement and mixing of the air can lead to elevated levels of airborne contaminants at the breathing height of skaters on the ice pad;
• Temperature and humidity conditions inside ice arenas are within the range of conditions that may increase the survival of SARS-CoV-2 in aerosol;
• Co-exposure to elevated levels of air pollutants, such as fine particulates and nitrogen dioxide, may worsen the severity of COVID infection;
• Highly aerobic activity like skating will enhance respiration rate, increasing the release of potentially infectious aerosol if COVID-19 infected individuals are on the ice; and,
• Highly aerobic activity will also enhance the risk of transmitting SARS-CoV-2 through increased breathing in of airborne contaminants.
• Politics:
• A year after Cares Act, watchdogs struggle to oversee trillions in coronavirus spending - Washington Post/Stars and Stripes (4.4.21)
• Biden will push through infrastructure plan if no Republican support - energy secretary says - Reuters (4.4.21)
• News: 
• Florida works to avoid ‘catastrophic’ pond collapse - AP News (4.4.21)
• Other Reading:
• Global COVID-19 Stats (JHU 4.4.21 8:20pm):
• 131,212,766 Known Cases
• 2,852,462 Known Deaths
• US COVID-19 Stats 
• CDC COVID-19 Vaccination Data Tracker
• JHU
• 30,706,121 Cases
• 555,001 Deaths
• CDC Data Tracker:
• +67,989 New Cases/30,492,334 Known Cases 
• +789 New Deaths/553,681 Known Deaths
• 207,891,295 Doses Delivered/165,053,746 Doses Administered
• Moderna  94,119,500 delivered/76,038,933 administered
• Pfizer 105,077,895 delivered/84,810,406 administered
• Janssen 8,693,900 delivered/4,054,089 administered
• California COVID-19 Stats:
• State of California Safe Schools For All Hub
• Vaccination progress dashboard
• Aggregate California ICU Bed Availability: 30.3%
• R-effective: 0.85
• 24,530,300 Doses Delivered/19,717,651 Doses Administered
• Doses Quartile HPI Quartile 1: 3,928,613 (4,000,000 is the goal)
• 2,400 New Cases/3,580,351 Total Cases (5.0 new cases/100k)
• 109 New Deaths/58,513 Total Deaths (0.17new deaths/100k)
• 1.7% 7-day test positivity rate
• 2,411 COVID-19 Hospitalizations (-18 patients, -0.7% from prior day)
• 568 COVID-19 ICU hospitalized in CA (-8 patients, -1.4% from prior day)
• 2,209 ICU beds available (+50 from prior day)

• San Diego County 
• Free Testing Sites and Schedule in San Diego
• VaccinationSuperstationSD
• Vaccination Dashboard
• San Diego County Of Education School Reopening Dashboard
• State Data:
• Southern California ICU Bed Availability: 32.7%
• R-effective: 0.84
• 299 New Cases/271,335 Total Cases
• 3 Deaths/3,571 Total Deaths
• 4.9 cases/100k population (Assessed on 3/30. Unadjusted Case Rate)
• 2.1% Test Positivity (Assessed on 3/30)
• 2.7% Health Equity Positivity (Assessed on 3/30)
• 208 COVID-19 hospitalized patients (+12 patients, +6.1% from prior day)
• 54 COVID-19 ICU hospitalized patients (-3 patients, -5.3% from prior day)
• 275 ICU beds available (+10 from prior day)
• County Data:
• 193 New Cases/271,527 Total Cases 
• 12 New Daily Deaths/3,583 Total Deaths
• 1,887,395 Doses Received/1,827,002 Doses Administered
• 1% Daily Test Positivity/2.3% (7-day avg after 7-day lag)/2.2% Test Positivity (14-day average)
• 4.9 cases/100k population (Assessed on 3/30. Adjusted case rate per 100,000 excluding prisons.) 
• 99% Case Investigation 
• 2.8% Day Over Day COVID-19 Hospitalizations (173 patients. -49% over 30 days)
• 39% ICU Capacity (52 patients. -54% over 30 days)
• 53 Staffed ICU Beds Available
• 4 New/13 Community Outbreaks (7-day)
• Universities:
• SDSU COVID-19, UCSD COVID-19, USD COVID-19, CSU San Marcos, PLNU