On Wednesday April 1 I began tracking the number of ‘serious, critical’ cases being reported in the USA.
These are the people who may likely die in the next few days.
If the ‘serious, critical’ number goes up, we will likely see more deaths. On the other hand if the various drugs being tested are effective in treating the virus, the ‘serious, critical’ number should go down.
Here are the numbers:
Apr 14 Tue 13473
Apr 15 Wed 13487
Apr 16 Thu 13369
Apr 17 Fri 13509
Apr 18 Sat 13551
Apr 19 Sun 13566
Apr 20 Mon 13951
Apr 21 Tue 14016
Apr 22 Wed 14016
Apr 23 Thu 14997
Apr 24 Fri 15097
We had a plateauing of serious/critical cases at 13,500 from April 14 thru April 19. And then a 500 patient jump on Monday . And Thursday we had a 1000 patient increase.
I looked at the worldometer website to see how they collect the serious/critical data: “Today, it represents for the most part the number of patients currently being treated in Intensive Care Unit (ICU), if and when this figure is reported.”
I am hoping the reason behind this recent 1,500 patient increase in serious/critical patients is due to the fact hospitals have many vacant ICU beds. If I were the hospital administrator it would be reasonable to move a covid patient from a regular hospital bed to ICU as they get more care and oversight.
What we need to see is a slowdown in the number of people who are serious/critical and a slowdown in the number of people dying. Unfortunately, neither is happening.
I also truncated the data to keep this posting shorter. Earlier numbers are available in DoughtyOne’s tables.
Offhand I can’t remember how to do it but I do remember there is a statistical method for determine if you are “doing enough tests”. Offhand I would say if the # of tests is 5 times the number of cases that’s probably “enough”.
This is an excerpt posted on FR-—
“””Instead, Atlas wrote, states should craft policies that focus on protecting the elderly and those with chronic underlying conditions. Targeting that segment of the population, although it’s smaller, will have the greatest impact on minimizing hospitalizations (preventing the health care system from becoming overwhelmed) and reducing deaths”””
Many of us ‘numbers’ guys have been saying the same thing.
The ‘at risk’ people in the USA are the ones who have a very high mortality rate if they get infected.
Whereas, the healthy working age population is getting infected, but they are not experiencing bad outcomes.
Healthy people need to go back to work. Healthy children need to go back to school. Vulnerable people need to keep hunkering down.
It does not seem the solution to the problem is any more complex than that.