COVID-19 In Texas June 2, 2020

[Eddie]

The official lockdown started on March 19th, almost exactly 11 weeks ago. Texas began to re-open at the end of April, and restaurants and other high-risk businesses re-opened at partial capacities on May 18th.

The Memorial Day weekend the bars re-opened in Austin and elsewhere, and anecdotally, there was a lot of risky behavior. Now a week later we have had a new higher one day peak in new cases (1949) set on 5-31-2020.

But.....with that said.....there is no TREND higher, we still are in the same general range.....what I've been calling a "plateau" stage, with daily new cases state-wide ranging from the high 500's to 1500, with very occasional spikes higher.

The death rate is definitely down, but not zero. The high was 58 deaths on May 14th, and the trend is promising. I think if people use a little common sense, we won't see a big new wave of disease over the summer.

Here in my county of practice, the new case rate is now very low, and there have only been a very few cases of community spread over the past week.

Details Screen Shot 2020 06 02 at 8 26 28 AM

Screen Shot 2020 06 02 at 8 26 28 AM

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[Surly1]

The official lockdown started on March 19th, almost exactly 11 weeks ago. Texas began to re-open at the end of April, and restaurants and other high-risk businesses re-opened at partial capacities on May 18th.

The Memorial Day weekend the bars re-opened in Austin and elsewhere, and anecdotally, there was a lot of risky behavior. Now a week later we have had a new higher one day peak in new cases (1949) set on 5-31-2020.

But.....with that said.....there is no TREND higher, we still are in the same general range.....what I've been calling a "plateau" stage, with daily new cases state-wide ranging from the high 500's to 1500, with very occasional spikes higher.

The death rate is definitely down, but not zero. The high was 58 deaths on May 14th, and the trend is promising. I think if people use a little common sense, we won't see a big new wave of disease over the summer.

Here in my county of practice, the new case rate is now very low, and there have only been a very few cases of community spread over the past week.

Do you have faith in the numbers as they are reported?

I know that the national trend is down. And Texas' numbers may be more reliable than those from Florida, Georgia, and Alabama, where the evidence for slow-walking the count is already in. Haven't seen stories about numbers-gaming from Texas.

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[Eddie]

The official lockdown started on March 19th, almost exactly 11 weeks ago. Texas began to re-open at the end of April, and restaurants and other high-risk businesses re-opened at partial capacities on May 18th.

The Memorial Day weekend the bars re-opened in Austin and elsewhere, and anecdotally, there was a lot of risky behavior. Now a week later we have had a new higher one day peak in new cases (1949) set on 5-31-2020.

But.....with that said.....there is no TREND higher, we still are in the same general range.....what I've been calling a "plateau" stage, with daily new cases state-wide ranging from the high 500's to 1500, with very occasional spikes higher.

The death rate is definitely down, but not zero. The high was 58 deaths on May 14th, and the trend is promising. I think if people use a little common sense, we won't see a big new wave of disease over the summer.

Here in my county of practice, the new case rate is now very low, and there have only been a very few cases of community spread over the past week.

Do you have faith in the numbers as they are reported?

I know that the national trend is down. And Texas' numbers may be more reliable than those from Florida, Georgia, and Alabama, where the evidence for slow-walking the count is already in. Haven't seen stories about numbers-gaming from Texas.

I think the numbers are fairly accurate.....if we were in some massive spike it would show up in hospitalizations and ventilator utilization. We have seen various hot spots....the most recent being in the meat plants in the panhandle.....now looks to be getting under control.

Looks like Houston and Harris county have passed Dallas as the main epicenter...which is not surprising, given the big population. Dallas is still at number 2.

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[Eddie]

Texas is shaping up for a COVID uptick, as far as new cases. Since June 1, the trend is definitely slightly up overall, although some counties that had big problems in
April (like the county where I practice) are still seeing the new cases decline. We haven't had a new community spread case reported in Williamson County at all since May 29th.

But Texas is a big state with 28.7 million people. The virus is not even in all counties...but all the urban counties have cases, and there is an ample reservoir of people still shedding virus. I expect the lack of social distancing related to some of the urban protests will show up as a spike in areas that were getting better.

Details

The map is too big to get the whole state. There are a couple of counties at the tip of far south Texas that are also at the "medium" orange level. I posted this to show how irregular the penetration is ....in Llano County where my lake cottage is, there have only been 3 cases total reported, This is only a half hour drive from Austin, where there have been over 3500 cases reported.

Details Screen Shot 2020 06 05 at 8 19 32 AM

Screen Shot 2020 06 05 at 8 19 32 AM

What I see in the overall stats is a new higher plateau.....most days now up in the 1200-1500 case range statewide.....we have to wait to see if the curve turns up more steeply....I think the  medical facilities are not overrun....but if we see this trend start to break out to higher levels, we could quickly be back in deep shit.

People are ready for this to be over. They want to ignore it, forget about it, and get back to normal....Trouble is that we are not out of the woods. Not by a long shot.

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