More Covid-19 tribulation is in store for Mississippi during the current surge if the past pandemic patterns are any indication. The Covid-19 transmission rate reached its peak in mid-July. Unfortunately, the Rt value is still above the peaks for the previous January and July surges, ensuring the pandemic will probably worsen over the few weeks. A UMC official said Mississippi's health care system could fail in the next week to ten days if current trends continue. Article.
Rt is the transmission rate of a virus. An Rt value of 1.0 means one infected person is infecting another person. As Rt rises, one infected person is infecting more people. For example, measles has an Rt value over 12, hence why it is feared so much. Most flu and cold viruses are around 2. A virus is burning out if Rt falls below 1.0.
The research team at JJ cobbled together the graphs for Rt, hospitalizations, cases, ICU's, vents, and deaths in Mississippi. If the Rt is a reliable indicator, the current rise in cases will continue to surge for a while.
 |
| Click on image to enlarge. |
*Note: Red: # of hospitalizations, Green: # of ICU's, blue: # of patients on vents, green/red: Rt value. Y-axis is 1.0. Bottom graph is 7-day moving average of Covid-19 patient deaths.
 |
| Number of cases |
A Rt increase preceded every Covid-19 surge in Mississippi. The Rt value rose above 1 on June 1, 2020. It peaked at 1.2 two weeks later and fell below 1.0 by the middle of July.The cases began increasing a few days later. However, the hospitalizations and ICU population did not peak until the middle of July when Rt was at 0.98.
The December-January surge followed the same pattern. Rt began to rise at the beginning of October until it peaked at 1.13 on October 30. Although the peak was lower than it was in June, the peak actually resembled more of a plateau because it remained at 1.13 until October 20 when it finally subsided. The sustained peak transmission rate swamped the Mississippi health care system as ICU's and hospitals overflowed with Covid-19 patients.
Rt fell below 1.0 around Christmas. However, hospitalizations, ICUs, and deaths peaked on January 8, two weeks later.
The hype about the more contagious nature of the Delta variant is not just hype. The Rt value rose above 1.0 on June 14. It hit an apex of 1.50 on July 15. It has fallen substantially since then but it is still at a very troubling 1.3. Thus it is still near the peak Rt value for the July 2020 and January surges.
Case numbers rose to an unprecedented 5,021 patients August 12. Hospitalizations and ICUs are at record levels as well.
If Rt is any indication, the situation may get even worse over the next few days or weeks until Rt finally falls below 1.0.
However, there is one encouraging trend - if it holds. See the chart posted above. Even though every metric is setting records, the number of deaths have not increased that much. The daily average number of Covid-19 deaths is approximately 14, far below the peaks at similar points in the earlier surges.
Kingfish note: Dr. Dobbs does not agree with my use of Rt and that is fair. Some readers will surely attack this post and that is fair. The analysis is one for debate but it is worth debating. The CDC, Johns Hopkins University, Stanford, and Yale contributed to the Rt website used for this post. Rt website.
Dr. Dobbs and Dr. Byers discounted the historical analysis and said based on certain percentages, they expected many more patients to die. For example, Dr. Byers said they knew that 15% of those admitted the hospital would die, xx% of those in ICU would die, and so on. Maybe so, maybe not.
Some readers will undoubtedly point out the Rt stats are models are changed and they are correct. However, even if the numbers change somewhat, the trends and patterns will probably remain the same.
Posted below is the data used for this post. It was gleaned from the Rt and MSDH websites.
JULY 2020 Surge
Rt Value
The Rt value "only" increased to 1.2 in mid-June but that was enough to swamp the health care system a few weeks later. However, Rt was already below one when the Covid-19 surge peaked in July. Rt peaked at a higher value than it did in November. However, the virus burned out pretty quickly in the summer of 2020 while the lower November 2020 value stayed above 1.0 for a longer period of time, causing a much higher surge.
June 1: 1.01
June 16: 1.2 (peak)
July 21: 0.98
Cases (7-day average)
Mississippi settled down. after the initial spate of cases in the spring of 2020. The average number of cases on June 6, 2020 was 305 but the surge began 10 days later and finally subsided in August.
June 6: 305
June 27: 709
July 19: 1,168
August 14: 746
September 10: 471
Hospitalizations (ICUs)
The hospitalizations followed the same trend although they didn't really settle down until October, just in time for the next surge.
June 6: 358 (133)
June 17: 483 (165)
July 23: 975 (279)
August 16: 627 (289)
August 29: 627 (207)
October 2: 412 (132)
Deaths (7 day average)
Covid-19 deaths followed the same pattern. When deaths reached their highest peak on July 31, 2020, Rt was already at 0.90.
June 27: 10
July 8: 19
July 31: 33
September 9: 15
October 9: 11
JANUARY 2021
The December-January surge easily surpassed the the July outbreak. Rt began to climb on October 11, 2020 and peaked twenty days later at 1.13. That value may not seem that much but it remained at that level for three weeks. It finally subsided below 1.0 around Christmas.
The lower but longer Rt value meant the Covid-19 outbreak swamped Mississippi's hospitals and ICUs. Average deaths peaked at 47 per day while some individual days saw nearly sixty deaths.
Rt
October 11: 1.03
October 30: 1.13
November 20: 1.13
December 24: 1.01
Cases (7-day average)
October 8: 607
November 1: 681 (The real increase begins here)
November 27: 1,192
January 3: 2,226
January 8: 2,353
February 12: 709
Hospitalizations (ICUs)
October 2: 393 (125)
October 21: 599 (157)
November 4: 560 (168)
December 4: 1,051 (286)
January 5: 1,433 (358)
February 1: 898 (262)
March 4: 366 (99)
Deaths
October: Hovered between 10 and 13
November 3: 14
December 12: 37 (Increase is almost linear)
January 8: 46
January 22: 42
February 19: 14
JULY 2021
Unfortunately, this appears to be the worse Covid-19 surge yet. The Rt value shot up to 1.50 in mid-July. It has decreased substantially but is still at 1.16. That value is the same as the peaks in the January and July 2020 surges. All of the pandemic metrics reflect the higher transmission rate.
Rt
June 14: 1.02
July 15: 1.50
August 9: 1.16
Cases
June 18: 124 (We've won)
July 14: 484 (The Reign of Terror begins)
July 26: 1,359
August 2: 2,473
August 14: 5,023 (Worst ever)
Hospitalizations (ICUs)
June 24: 94 (29)
June 26: 109 (28)
July 3: 137 (40)
August 4: 1,154 (259)
August 12: 1,497 (395) (Worst ever)
Deaths (7-day average)
Deaths have been been lower since the August 5 peak so it will probably decrease a little in the next few days although it will undoubtedly rise again. However, the deaths are much lower than they were at the peaks of the earlier surges even though the July 2021 surge has been the worst one yet. Vaccines working?
July 2-10: 2
July 21: 6
August 2: 10
August 5: 14
33 comments:
The virus is bad. It is getting worse. You have had 18 months of warning. If you are at risk, take precaution. If you think you are not, good for you. None of this is a shock, don't shut the world down because people refuse to take precautions with fair warning.
Is the medical naval ship still on the way?
You should definitely be afraid if you have made a lot of bad life choices and spent your life abusing the precious body that God gave you.
Feds denied the ship. Catch up.
Get vaccinated. What is so hard about that?
St. Dominic’s is offering a contract for 13
Weeks for ANY nurse -- $80 per hour with a $3,500 bonus at the end of 13 weeks!”
Mississippi has lost 2,000 nurses statewide
The last 6 months with nurses resigning.
who can blame the nurses for quitting. i can’t imagine the loss of life and stress of being yelled at by patients. “it’s nothing. not covid”. or “just a few more minutes to catch my breath”. “i don’t need a ventilator.”
over. and over and over again.
Many nurses are quitting because of the mandated vaccines.
Where is the “no worse than the flu” crowd that entertained us back in March-June of 2020?
What about the “hot weather will end this” group from the same time frame?
WHERE. ARE. YOU. NOW?!? (Imbeciles.)
We are at a point now where most who intended to get vaccinated have done that. I think we are now in another "Thin out the herd" segment of the pandemic in the USA. Hopefully this thing won't mutate in the unvaccinated part of the herd and wipe out all of us.
9:01 I think the imbeciles are over with Dr. Fauchi and the flatten curved docs of Spring 2020.
The "science" changes its mind a lot
Nurses are leaving because like all labor, Mississippi won’t pay. Plenty of nurses in Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Arizona, Nevada, Iowa, Wyoming, and Utah.
The Navy hospital ship story was faux news invented by the left.
@9:00
If they are scared of a little vaccine, we don't need them as nurses. Out with the old/tired/left-behind employees, in with modern/better ones.
@10:45pm - Yep, good riddance. If damn nurses don’t understand the importance of vaccines, I wouldn’t want them taking care of me anyway.
Nothing has been as well managed as tates response to covid and its upswing.
He is all over tv begging people to get vaccine.
He won’t stop helping kids with mask advocacy.
Wait….that’s wrong. Tate split town and said screw Mississippi
Tate…what a turd.
'The Navy hospital ship story was faux news invented by the left.'
You seem to have forgotten the Hospital Ship Trump had moored off the coast of New York. Remember? It was unused...another Cuomo decision as he stuffed more and more infected folks into nursing homes.
Nurse quitting or being fired for refusing the vaccine is FAUX NEWS! They have mostly left because they are burned out.
JJ did a good job of posting a modeling metric. I am not a big fan of the Rt because I am not a big fan of modeling. So may have been incorrect.
There is a certain logic in the figures. This variant (Delta) has a shorter incubation in the host (average four days) and it grows faster. The net result is that it isn't detected until the host is already spreading it a lot.
Mix that with a large vulnerable population (low vaccination rate) and hosts who are fat and you have a recipe for an awful result. And we are getting it.
COVID will now run an ugly course. The hospitals will be unable to handle this.
The worst part of it is the danger this poses to people who have an unmet medical emergency like a severely broken bone or trauma or a heart attack.
Stay away from people, if you can, and lay low. It will burn out but it will take time. And keep your fingers crossed that you don't need care in a hospital.
@7:30 AM - is that all you can pen - a straw man rebuttal? Of course the USN has hospital ships; and yes, one was moored in NYC to assist with the pandemic.
However, that doesn't have a f'ing thing to do with Mississippi and the faux story of a hospital ship coming here.
Here is a reminder of the Global covid-19 stats
Global Coronavirus Cases:
207,758,858
Deaths:
4,372,205
Recovered:
186,235,389
N O T H I N G B U R G E R
August 14, 2021 at 8:01 PM
Can still contract, transmit and even die. See Lee Vance.
... and the faux story of a hospital ship coming here.
You didn't watch the presser before depositing another "faux" comment. Look in your mirror to discover the fool.
10:08 - so 1/40 of all humans were infected and 4 millions died. Let’s assume that all humans will get it with the same death rate. That would be 160 000 000 dead. Half the US. Or Germany twice.
Are you that heartless? Can you look yourself in the eyes in front of a mirror? Is that what they taught you in Sunday school?
My wife is a nurse with 34 years on the job. She retired earlier than planned (Jan 2021) due to the hospital's requiring reusing a face mask for a week and similar outrageous penny pinching policies that endangered the staff and patients.
I didn't approve several comments because they are rehashing vaccines. There are several threads on this site recently where you have been able to wage holy war against and for vaccines to your hearts' content. Keep it over there.
Didn't approve one because it was just about immigration and had nothing to do with the subject of the post.
Also, another one was fine until he started making Jewish references at the end. We have one reader who tries to make anti-semitic comments all the time. Not allowed and not sorry.
so the ABC article was a lie asking for the Comfort to come assist MS? Also who is staffing the outside zField Hospital at UMMC? It is not all about money many ICU nurses who have been vaccinated have families to consider too! They and all healthcare workers deserve to go home to their families!
Certainly. It will get worst before it gets better. We are set in our ways now. No vaccine no mask no hospital staff no hospital rooms. If you haven’t talked with a love one recently, pick up the phone and call them. Tell your elderly parents that you love them. Mississippi majority population is elderly. A whole bunch of folks that are not elderly are not in good health: overweight, smokers, methheads, drinkers, potheads hiv etc…. Very few of us are ready for this fight. You might think you are but unless you are fit, young, and have zero underlining conditions you are in for the fight of your life. I ain’t fussing at you, I am telling you! And I ain’t made at you. I am just telling you.
1:21 is a helpful comment. Let us know where the lines are drawn.
According to the global numbers posted at 10:08, that's a 2% global death rate for a highly-transmissible virus. Coupled with hospitals overrun with the sick for Florida to Oregon, I wonder what it takes to qualify as a "something burger" for that guy.
I can't help but wonder why he is so intent on downplaying the severity of this thing. Is he trying to convince his parents to let him go out and play with his friends at a music festival? What gives?
@2:54
Yup, he shot his argument in the foot.
That said, there are so many infected right now that it’s mathematically impossible for us to slow this thing down currently. In short it’s going to get a lot worse before it gets better.
1.) 100% vaccination will not solve this; there is not invisible wall around the USA to protect from less vaccinated countries.
2.) This "bat virus" infects other mammals. There is no way to eliminate it now period.
All the eggs are in this vaccination basket, and it is now a matter of time before the inevitable stumble happens and the eggs break. People need to really reason and think without emotion and use logic
There is no simple or glittering solution.
@5:14pm 1.) If we were 100% vaccinated it would do a tremendous amount haha, none of the variants, thus far, completely get around the Vaccine. If we were 100% vaccinated death rate would plummet, infections numbers would plummet. It's the issue people have understanding benefit of masks, it's not all or nothing, even minor amounts of protection can be helpful, and 100% masking, 100% vaccination would do an incredible amount of good. Would it completely "solve this" no but it would certainly go a long way towards that.
2.) Do you have some profound godlike knowledge? Does it look likely we eliminate this thing? Very much no but science can change, our knowledge can change, it's unreasonable to say there's no way it can be eliminated.
When you think with Logic instead of emotion, you will see you know a whole lot less than you think you do, much like myself. Our knowledge is ever evolving, and it does us absolutely no good to approach this from your standpoint
Post a Comment