NJ 2020 04 25

We start as usual with the total:

and then the death tally:

which is staying low. We expect another weekend of confused data. It seems however that many deaths, a third, are Nursing Homes.

Prevalence is flattening which is a concern.

It is reflected in the county numbers as well

whereas the county 14 day running tally is negative now for 8 consecutive days.

and Passaic is the only large positive.

The doubling times are holding very high

and this holds across counties

The above is the summary chart, the gap between Infected and Recovered should be narrowing. This seems to imply some lingering group of contacts continuing to spread the infection.

Kipling...Words for the Time

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream -- and not make dreams your
master;
If you can think -- and not make thoughts your
aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools;
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings -- nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run --
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And -- which is more -- you'll be a Man, my son!

How Much is Out There?

The biggest problem we face is having a grasp on the prevalence of the infection. Science reports on the variations and disagreements across the board. We have argued the following:

1. Testing is critical, both for the RNA and the Antibody, Ab.

2. Testing has a False Negative (FN) and False Positive (FP). The latter is as bad as the former. A False negative allows an infected individual to continue to infect. A false positive tells us that there are more infected people with no symptoms. Both can be dangerous.

3. The FP, FN conundrum is solved via validation of testing methodologies. Yet even they are not done well.

4. The fundamental issues regarding transmission do not seem to be well understood. Masks may or may not be of any use. They are symbols,  shibboleth to be used to make it appear we know what we are doing. The irony is that one sees health care workers with masks but no gloves. The gloves should and must be the first line of defense. On removing the mask one must first keep the glove and then remove the mask and then immediately clean the face and hands. Not to mention totally infested head hair, a significant carrier, a literal petri dish.

5. Sampling theory for populations is a well known technique. However we seem to be getting poorly done samples that may be anecdotal but useless. Furthermore we can adjust for FN/FB biases if and only if we know the specific FN/FB numbers. Otherwise we seem to be "shingling in the fog" and there is no roof below us.

Just some thoughts after discussions with colleagues.

NJ 2020 04 24

The total is still growing.

Deaths are dropping

Prevalence is dropping as well

County prevalence is down

County 14 day stats holding negative now for a week. Gov was to announce opening rules but do not count on it. Data was 6 hours late today. I guess they still fiddle with the data.

Total by town shows a few hot spots.

Some Thoughts on Testing

 

I know it is a bit hard but the issue is that we have tests with high false negatives and positives. I did a quick back of the envelope test and using some 30% false reports, the answere are often dominated by the false and not the true value. This is most likely a real problem both in Santa Clara and New York. I guess it helps to know something.

1984?

Stay Home...Stay Alive
Flatten the Curve
Social Distancing

They continue, signs on every road, sayings on every sign.

Then I re-read Orwell:

The Ministry of Truth—Minitrue, in Newspeak—was startlingly different from any other object in sight. It was an enormous pyramidal structure of glittering white concrete, soaring up, terrace after terrace, three hundred meters into the air. From where Winston stood it was just possible to read, picked out on its white face in elegant lettering, the three slogans of the Party: 
 
WAR IS PEACE 
FREEDOM IS SLAVERY
IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH.

What curve are we to flatten, does anyone know. Do the people telling us know, is the curve based on data, is the data true. If I stay at home, will I live, for how long. What if I am dying of cancer, will staying at home cure me?

Slogans now abound, they tell people all sorts of things. Is there a real Ministry of Truth preparing these slogans. Do they understand what the words mean? Perhaps a Poll, yes a poll to test the public.

But as Orwell begins:

IT WAS A BRIGHT cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.

Will it ever strike thirteen again?