Covid crashing in LA county

[bigbossman]

Duenor bring your statistics !

>crickets<

[Den60]

I'm guessing we will start seeing a lot of influenza cases now.

[ACfixer]

I think it is due to herd immunity.

Please tell me you're joking.

[Sgt. J Beezy]

New cases have gone from 22k/day on Jan 4 to around 6k now. The hospitals are starting to trend down with 8k on Jan 5 to 6k now, but if this follows the reduction in cases they will be emptying out over the next few weeks.



I think it is due to herd immunity. The documented cases are over 10% of the population. A lot more got it, but never got tested. I'm thinking it is probably 40% or even 50%. Who knows, maybe more.



It may be more or less over. Well at least in LA county where it has spread like crazy.

[mr goodguy]

It’s trending down that’s for sure. I’ve been to 3 hospitals in the last few days in Orange and Er is starting to see regular pt... no more pt in the hallway not a lot of code blue I heard

[MrBlond]

Open the gyms.

[M1NM]

Super bowl is in a few weeks. I mention this because it seems that anytime an event where people gather, Pols use it as an opportunity to rattle people's cages.

Not now Trump is out. Now it's how fast they can get back to people paying taxes. The science has never mattered.

[SanDiego619]

At this point, it is so painfully obvious that our two resident "experts" have given up their vigorous misinformation campaign and have scurried off to parts unknown.

Their mission has been accomplished (president biden)

They'll pop up in two and four years spouting CNN propaganda night and day.

[as_rocketman]

New cases have gone from 22k/day on Jan 4 to around 6k now. The hospitals are starting to trend down with 8k on Jan 5 to 6k now, but if this follows the reduction in cases they will be emptying out over the next few weeks.

I think it is due to herd immunity. The documented cases are over 10% of the population. A lot more got it, but never got tested. I'm thinking it is probably 40% or even 50%. Who knows, maybe more.

It may be more or less over. Well at least in LA county where it has spread like crazy.

So... my interpretation only, as someone who's been watching this for a while:

The recent decrease is now confirmed, but only to a point. Be careful when looking at the number of cases, as that number varies with testing and test reporting. More recently they changed the PCR threshold number to be considered a "positive," and that will have some effect. There are also good reasons for that number to decrease without any real change in the disease evolution, such as finally keeping track of tests and not double-counting positives.

The hospitalization rate is gamed as well. When hospitals get slammed, they start shifting to a greater percentage of in-home care. Additionally people who think they might be infected may tend to stay away from hospitals when it gets bad, or they might not be able to access health care at all. But the occupation rate is a reasonable indicator, so long as you recognize that it isn't linear with respect to the incidence of the disease.

Death rates are more reliable, but that's a lagging indicator. The other metric to go by is the test positivity rate, viz., the percentage of all tests administered that come back as positive, which doesn't tell you anything about the disease itself but does allow you to validate the flakier estimates.

Right now, all metrics are dropping. As we approached the plateau, the test positivity rate went crazy high (> 20%) which meant there could be additional cases not going reported. Currently that metric is somewhere around 11% (reporting lags slightly) which means the other measurements are probably reliable.

Why? Well, my guess is that to first order you can call it "herd immunity," but keep in mind that people are not a single, monolithic herd. The first pulse we saw in April was clustered in the elderly, and to some degree, the upper class, as our initial vectors were spread by international travel. The latest spike was "unexpected" only because it involved a population that hadn't been infected before, and one that had little interface with the previous herd. We saw it start to ramp up seasonally but also coincident with secondary and college schools, and it clearly increased with holiday travel and gatherings. It also showed a different occupational bias -- the early spike was strong in health care professionals, as you might expect, but the newer wave is strongest in construction.

That wave is probably petering out. However, we still have ~70-80% of the population that really hasn't been exposed yet. So the potential remains for another spike, or maybe two or three, comparable to the one that is just now dropping off.

Or it might not happen. Dynamics within the remaining groups might be different, and it might not propagate nearly so fast. It's possible there will be no big spikes at all from here on out, but only a long tail.

I would bet on the long tail being the most likely but for one thing: We are just now entering harsh weather. I cannot retire the feeling that seasonality is a huge driver of this pandemic, not so much for virus properties but for how conditions drive human behavior. So I can't rule out another big spike, possibly even a worse one.

The other wildcard is the impact of mutations. We could see a worse strain. I do not believe the new strains the news has been breathlessly reporting about are really all that different, as there is little actual evidence to support this; but it could happen. I don't think it will.

Doubtless there are far more scholarly and detailed models out there compared to my seat-of-the-pants analysis. You can rely on one of those if you like. My personal advice is unchanged -- take reasonable precautions, and live your life. It is better now than a few weeks ago but it is still serious. Now is not the time to gamble, but by now you should know how to reduce your own personal risks.

[Den60]

So... my interpretation only, as someone who's been watching this for a while:

The recent decrease is now confirmed, but only to a point. Be careful when looking at the number of cases, as that number varies with testing and test reporting. More recently they changed the PCR threshold number to be considered a "positive," and that will have some effect. There are also good reasons for that number to decrease without any real change in the disease evolution, such as finally keeping track of tests and not double-counting positives.

The hospitalization rate is gamed as well. When hospitals get slammed, they start shifting to a greater percentage of in-home care. Additionally people who think they might be infected may tend to stay away from hospitals when it gets bad, or they might not be able to access health care at all. But the occupation rate is a reasonable indicator, so long as you recognize that it isn't linear with respect to the incidence of the disease.

Death rates are more reliable, but that's a lagging indicator. The other metric to go by is the test positivity rate, viz., the percentage of all tests administered that come back as positive, which doesn't tell you anything about the disease itself but does allow you to validate the flakier estimates.

Right now, all metrics are dropping. As we approached the plateau, the test positivity rate went crazy high (> 20%) which meant there could be additional cases not going reported. Currently that metric is somewhere around 11% (reporting lags slightly) which means the other measurements are probably reliable.

Why? Well, my guess is that to first order you can call it "herd immunity," but keep in mind that people are not a single, monolithic herd. The first pulse we saw in April was clustered in the elderly, and to some degree, the upper class, as our initial vectors were spread by international travel. The latest spike was "unexpected" only because it involved a population that hadn't been infected before, and one that had little interface with the previous herd. We saw it start to ramp up seasonally but also coincident with secondary and college schools, and it clearly increased with holiday travel and gatherings. It also showed a different occupational bias -- the early spike was strong in health care professionals, as you might expect, but the newer wave is strongest in construction.

That wave is probably petering out. However, we still have ~70-80% of the population that really hasn't been exposed yet. So the potential remains for another spike, or maybe two or three, comparable to the one that is just now dropping off.

Or it might not happen. Dynamics within the remaining groups might be different, and it might not propagate nearly so fast. It's possible there will be no big spikes at all from here on out, but only a long tail.

I would bet on the long tail being the most likely but for one thing: We are just now entering harsh weather. I cannot retire the feeling that seasonality is a huge driver of this pandemic, not so much for virus properties but for how conditions drive human behavior. So I can't rule out another big spike, possibly even a worse one.

The other wildcard is the impact of mutations. We could see a worse strain. I do not believe the new strains the news has been breathlessly reporting about are really all that different, as there is little actual evidence to support this; but it could happen. I don't think it will.

Doubtless there are far more scholarly and detailed models out there compared to my seat-of-the-pants analysis. You can rely on one of those if you like. My personal advice is unchanged -- take reasonable precautions, and live your life. It is better now than a few weeks ago but it is still serious. Now is not the time to gamble, but by now you should know how to reduce your own personal risks.

Thanks for the thesis.

Most on here think it is just a political decision. We like to KISS. I look at the data here in San Diego and it is actually worse than 3-4 weeks ago. Still not the "crisis" the "panic twins" liked to post when Trump was President, but no reason to make a major change based on actual statistics. There was really no reason to shut down 2 months ago (other than political) and there is no reason to open up now (other than political).

As for "worse strains" most viruses do not do so as increased mortality is selected against. Most viruses attenuate and there is no reason to think this virus is any different.

We are now seeing therapeutic treatments with Ivermectin and/or HCQ become more mainstream. Mom mother's Doc put my mom on the Marik protocol with Ivermectin, she is not a big fan of the current vaccines.

[TheVazha]

[bigbossman]

You forgot the sarcasm emoji.

[five.five-six]

New cases have gone from 22k/day on Jan 4 to around 6k now. The hospitals are starting to trend down with 8k on Jan 5 to 6k now, but if this follows the reduction in cases they will be emptying out over the next few weeks.

I think it is due to herd immunity. The documented cases are over 10% of the population. A lot more got it, but never got tested. I'm thinking it is probably 40% or even 50%. Who knows, maybe more.

It may be more or less over. Well at least in LA county where it has spread like crazy.

You misspelled: Biden inauguration.

[Prepped and ready]

2020 was the year of the largest political Scams in history.

Covid was one of them.

Capitol Hill was proof of that. Insurrection was being pushed so hard, nobody brought up the fact that, there were thousends of poeple with No masks. That single event should have caused a massive spike in covid numbers, with people coming from all over the country.

[bigmike82]

That said, what ever did happen to that Christmas spike?

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Did you miss the part where LA County was basically out of ICU beds? My hospital spiked up to well over 3 times what we had in the early days. The curve ticked up the second week of November, hit the same level as the first max the first week of December, and hit the last peak a few days after New Years. There has been an ongoing winter spike since November, which they predicted months ago.

What if I were to tell you that ... the number of cases, the seriousness of the situation, and the politicians here being a bunch of ****ing dumbasses ... all exist in the same god damn universe? What if these 'coincidences' aren't planned but simply fallout from idiots, at all levels of government, having ****all idea of what they're doing and scrambling to save their reputation?

This **** is serious. This is real. This is not overblown nor overhyped. This is really, really bad.

The outdoor dining ban is stupid. Newsom sucks. The Board of Sups are a bunch of idiots. Elected officials have less than no idea what they're doing, and everyone at the upper levels is winging it while your neighbors who work in hospitals are watching people die every day because their family and neighbors are selfish toddlers who chose to hang out with friends, go to outdoor exercise classes, maskless, while breathing in each others' sweat and have parties.

The Dems and the Repubs have handled this **** like a bunch of idiots, and that's clouding the fact that people who have the medical background to at least partly understand what's going on (like Fauci) are making educated guesses because ... guess what ... medicine, and viruses, and the human body, is complicated as hell.

We stopped caring about competence in government a long time ago, and that **** is coming home to roost in a big way.