COVID-19 Tracking | The Homa Files

From the get-go I concluded that “confirmed cases” was a problematic metric (due to false positives, varying testing methods and confirmation criteria, and an uncertain mix of people being tested and their outcomes) …. and that our laser focus should be on “daily new deaths” which, while subject to some definitional variance, is a binary, countable number.

See MUST READ: How will we know when we’ve turned a COVID-19 corner?

Somewhat contrary to my own advice, a couple of weeks ago, I started including the Case Fatality Rate (CFR%) in my morning COVID stats post.

Why is that “somewhat contrary to my own advice”?

Dividing a reasonably reliable number (deaths) by a potentially flakey number (cases) usually results in a potentially flakey “synthetic number” that might be misleading.

There was a glaring upward trend in the CSR%.

Noting the upward trend in the CFR%, a couple of readers asked “Why? What’s going on?”

In a prior post, I took a stab at the answer:

The simple arithmetic answer to the question: The CFR% is going up because daily deaths have plateaued (i.e. stabilized at their peak level) … while confirmed cases have fallen sharply.

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While that’s true, it didn’t really answer “why?”, so I started looking at the component number that was exhibiting the greatest variance: confirmed cases.

Why did cases explode, spike and then start declining so steeply?

Were these movements real or just loud statistical noise?

(more…)

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MUST READ: How will we know when we’ve turned a COVID-19 corner?

February 18, 2021

Stay focused on the number of Daily New Deaths!
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This is a relevant excerpt from a long ago prior post (May 2020)
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Why have I centered on Daily New Deaths (DND) as my key metric?

First, saving lives is our paramount objective, right? If yes, it should be our focus metric.

Second, I think that most other metrics that are being bandied about are quite problematic.

Counting deaths — while a bit macabre — is a more reliable process than counting, say, the number of infected people.

Sure, I’d like to know the number of people infected with COVID-19.

But, unless everybody — or at lest a large statistical sample — is tested, the number of confirmed cases is subject to lots of statistical issues.

Most notably, who is being tested and who isn’t? What about the asymptomatic “hidden carriers”? What are the criteria for confirming a COVID infection? What about false positives (and false negatives)? How to standardize the reporting processes across states? How to keep governmental units from fudging the numbers?

Importantly, if testing increases, then confirmed cases goes up.

Is that an indication of more virus spread or just a reflection of more testing?

I sure can’t tell.

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Again, counting fatalities is probably the most reliable metric.

Fatalities are discrete events – so they’re countable.

Still, even deaths may have some counting imperfections.

For example, many non-hospitalized people die and are buried without autopsies. Some may be uncounted COVID victims.

On the other hand, some people may die and be diagnosed with COVID infections. That doesn’t necessarily mean that COVID killed them. That’s especially true with COVID since it’s most deadly for people with other health problems.

And, as we stated above, the definition of COVID deaths has changed:

COVID-related” means “COVID present”, not necessarily “COVID caused” … and that, along the way, “present” was redefined from “confirmed” to “presumed”

Further, COVID deaths are a function of two drivers: the incidence of the virus … and, the nature, level and timing of therapeutic healthcare.

Said differently, more effective therapeutic healthcare will dampen the death toll.

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Bottom line: “Daily New Deaths” is the number we should be watching.

If it shows a consistent downward trend, then we’ll know we’ve turned the corner.

If it stays stable (at a high level) or turns upward, we’ll know that we’re in deep yogurt.

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Feb. 18: COVID VAX Stats

February 18, 2021

Vaccine Supply & Vaccinations

Vaccinations per Day

Vaccine Stockpile Doses NOT Administered

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Feb. 18: COVID Tracking Stats

February 18, 2021

Cases & Deaths

Note: At the index starting date, cases were
~ 100K and deaths were ~ 1,000 per day.

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Case Fatality Rate

See Why is the Case Fatality Rate increasing?

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Hospitalizations

Source: RonaViz.com

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Feb. 17: COVID VAX Stats

February 17, 2021

Vaccine Supply & Vaccinations

Vaccinations per Day

Vaccine Stockpile Doses NOT Administered

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Feb. 17: COVID Tracking Stats

February 17, 2021

Cases & Deaths

Note: At the index starting date, cases were
~ 100K and deaths were ~ 1,000 per day.

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Case Fatality Rate

See Why is the Case Fatality Rate increasing?

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Hospitalizations

Source: RonaViz.com

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Feb. 16: COVID Tracking Stats

February 16, 2021

Cases & Deaths

Note: For timely relevance, the starting point for this chart is set to November 1 … before the recent surge in cases and deaths. At the index starting date, cases were ~ 100K and deaths were ~ 1,000 per day.

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Case Fatality Rate

See Why is the Case Fatality Rate increasing?

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Hospitalizations

Source: RonaViz.com

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Feb. 15: COVID VAX Stats

February 15, 2021

Vaccine Supply & Vaccinations

Vaccinations per Day

Vaccine Stockpile Doses NOT Administered

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Feb. 15: COVID Tracking Stats

February 15, 2021

Cases & Deaths

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Case Fatality Rate

See Why is the Case Fatality Rate increasing?

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Hospitalizations

Source: RonaViz.com

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Feb. 14: COVID VAX Stats

February 14, 2021

Vaccine Supply & Vaccinations

Vaccinations per Day

Vaccine Stockpile Doses NOT Administered

Posted in COVID - vaccine, COVID-19 Tracking | Leave a Comment »

Feb. 14: COVID Tracking Stats

February 14, 2021

Cases & Deaths

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Case Fatality Rate

See Why is the Case Fatality Rate increasing?

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Hospitalizations

Source: RonaViz.com

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Feb, 13: COVID VAX Stats

February 13, 2021

Vaccine Supply & Vaccinations

Vaccinations per Day

Vaccine Stockpile Doses NOT Administered

Posted in COVID - vaccine, COVID-19 Tracking | Leave a Comment »

Feb.13: COVID Tracking Stats

February 13, 2021

Cases & Deaths

Note: For more timely relevance, the starting point for this chart has been advanced to November 1 … before the recent surge in cases and deaths. At this index starting date, cases were ~ 100K and deaths were ~ 1,000 per day.

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Case Fatality Rate

See Why is the Case Fatality Rate increasing?

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Hospitalizations

Source: RonaViz.com

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Why is the Case Fatality Rate increasing?

February 12, 2021

That’s a question that a couple of readers have asked, so…
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Daily, we’ve been posting a graph showing the Case Fatality Rate (CFR%): the ratio of COVID deaths to Confirmed COVID cases.

That number has been increasing … and, is now at 2.9%.

So, what’s going on??

(more…)

Posted in COVID-19 Tracking | 7 Comments »

Feb. 12: COVID VAX Stats

February 12, 2021

Vaccine Supply & Vaccinations

Vaccinations per Day

Vaccine Stockpile Doses NOT Administered

Posted in COVID - vaccine, COVID-19 Tracking | Leave a Comment »

Feb. 12: COVID Tracking Stats

February 12, 2021

Cases & Deaths

Note: The starting point has been advanced to November 1 … before the recent surge in cases and deaths (when cases were ~ 100K and deaths were ~ 1,000)

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Hospitalizations

Source: RonaViz.com

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Feb. 11: COVID VAX Stats

February 11, 2021

Vaccine Supply & Vaccinations

Vaccine Stockpile Doses NOT Administered

Vaccinations per Day

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Feb. 11: COVID Tracking Stats

February 11, 2021

Cases & Deaths

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Case Fatality Rate

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Hospitalizations

Source: RonaViz.com

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Feb. 10: COVID VAX Stats

February 10, 2021

Vaccine Supply & Vaccinations

Vaccine Stockpile Doses NOT Administered

Vaccinations per Day

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Feb. 10: COVID Tracking Stats

February 10, 2021

Cases & Deaths

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Case Fatality Rate

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Hospitalizations

Source: RonaViz.com

Posted in COVID-19 Tracking | 1 Comment »

Feb. 9: COVID VAX Stats

February 9, 2021

Vaccine Supply & Vaccinations

Vaccine Stockpile Doses NOT Administered

Vaccinations per Day

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Link to State by State Data

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Feb. 9: COVID Tracking Data

February 9, 2021

Cases & Deaths

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Case Fatality Rate

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Hospitalizations

Source: RonaViz.com

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VAX: Some of the unused vaccine inventory has been found!

February 8, 2021

We hate to say that we told you so, but…
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A couple of weeks ago, we pointed out that there were about 25 million “unused” doses of vaccine … and, they were probably being held in inventory by CVS & Walgreens (leftover from the program to vaccinate nursing homes) and hospitals (a “reserve” for 2nd shots and slow adopting medical staffs).

Our advice: claw back that excess inventory and redeploy it to high velocity vaccinators.

For background and details, see VAX Dx: Where the hell is the vaccine inventory?

Well, it took for “the science” and “the data” awhile to catch up, but according to the weekend Washington Post:

The federal government allocated too much vaccine to CVS & Walgreens to vaccinate patients and staff at nursing homes and long-term care facilities.

The doses — which were counted as part of each state’s allotment – over-counted the number of residents to be vaccinated, over-estimated the percentage of staff that would want the vaccine and didn’t realize that a 6^th dose could be squeezed out of many vials.

Finally, many states are starting to “repurpose” and redistribute hundreds of thousands of the unused doses to others outlets,

States can defer or cancel subsequent allocations to long-term-care facilities, transfer doses to the states’ general pool for reallocation to other vaccinators or leave excess vaccine doses with CVS and Walgreens who will soon begin vaccinating the general public in some states.

The CDC didn’t provide an estimate of how much excess CVS & Walgreens were holding.

My hunch: at least couple of million doses… a statistically significant amount at current supply rates … at least a couple of days worth of production … maybe more.

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Ok, they’re finally onto one pocket of unused available supply.

Going forward, here’s what to keep your eye on:

Our morning “VAX stats” post includes a chart showing the U.S. Vaccine Stockpile — the difference between “doses distributed” by the Feds and the “doses administered” by the states and locales.

The number has been hovering around 20 million doses.

Now that the majority of doses are being used as 2nd shots to the folks who got first shots in January, this “reserve” should be deployed and the above curve should quickly start to turn down — steeply as the 2nd dose reserves are being released.

If it doesn’t, you can bet that we’ll be on the case.

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P.S. West Virginia was the only state that didn’t participate in the Federal government’s partnership with CVS & Walgreens. Rather, WV used a network of local WV pharmacies to service nursing homes and long-term-care facilities. As a result, WV completed vaccinating those high priority facilities about a month before other states … and, the state has had a high vaccine utilization rate since doses were never stuck the CVS – Walgreen’s inventory.

Posted in COVID - vaccine, COVID-19 Tracking | 2 Comments »