NUMBERS ARE UP AGAIN

July 25, 2020

I keep a weekly calendar of things to do, and early in the Coronavirus epidemic I also noted how many weeks we had officially been ordered to shelter in place. A few days ago I realized I was no longer adding that number to my calendar pages. It had begun to feel so normal I had forgotten to keep counting. So I quickly updated the tally. Next week will be the 20th week of sheltering in place --- approaching half a year!

I've also been keeping track of the numbers of confirmed cases, number of people currently hospitalized, and cumulative number of deaths in our county as reported by county health officials. The number of currently hospitalized seems like the most reliable indicator of the rate of infection. In early April there was a surge of infection and the number of people hospitalized in a given day reached a peak of 285. A decline began in late April and by June 1st only 38 people were hospitalized. Since then, the numbers have gone up again. Today 176 people in our county are hospitalized with Covid-19.

We can ask if the opening of some businesses and the partying that went on over the Memorial Day weekend and the Independence Day weekend are the cause. It seems that isolating as much possible, going out only for urgent reasons, no socializing in person, and wearing masks and other hygeinic practictics will be the only way we can get this plague under control. And ALL of us must take these precautions to make them effective.