Our New Reality: Unmitigated COVID Spread
“We are on a very difficult trajectory. We are going in the wrong direction. If things do not change, if they continue on the course we’re on, there’s gonna be a whole lot of pain in this country with regard to additional cases and hospitalizations, and deaths.”
The U.S. will soon report over 100,000 new cases of coronavirus daily, with that figure rising as long as states keep schools open. Unless the nation takes collective vigilant action, American families are in store for devastation never before experienced in the United States. The White House coronavirus task force is warning states in the middle and western regions that they require aggressive measures to curb the virus’ spread.
BAD DATA KILLS
“It could influence behavior among the public. The neighborhood data, the county data, and metro-area data can be really helpful for people to say, ‘Whoa, they’re not kidding, this is right here.’ It can help public health prevention folks get their messages across and get people to change their behavior.”
States like Florida are not counting all pandemic-related deaths—deliberately mislabeling assumed COVID deaths. Most states do not report a full picture of school-related infections, which would show that reopening schools has been an unmitigated disaster nationwide.
According to researchers at the CDC, the actual number of pandemic-related deaths in Florida alone could be 25 percent higher than reported if you include people listed as having died of other causes brought on by the pandemic. The real toll from the epidemic includes casualties from people who waited too long to go to the hospital, overdose after relapsing, and people who probably died from the virus but never received a test.
Useful data is critical to understanding the disease, tracking it, and stopping it. Without good data, health experts are flying blind. Obscuring accurate information is a crime against humanity that makes health outcomes worse for the entire nation. Facilities in Atlanta, Minneapolis, and Baltimore metro areas are at 80 percent maximum capacity. Tampa, Birmingham, and New York metro areas are above 95 percent capacity of available ICU beds and rising.
Knowing where the strain is occurring can help national health experts tailor responses to those areas. However, the CDC is obstructing those figures' public availability, which NPR only made available this week after it received a copy of leaked documents. This behavior will increase the number of COVID deaths because it prevents health experts from having a complete understanding of the virus.
