All quiet on the covid front

So far, all indicators in the US is that things are improving. We just had Memorial Day and it felt like people were starting to come out and enjoy life, even though we have not reached the “herd immunity” levels. The Northeast has the highest vaccination levels while the South has the lowest. As a matter of fact, all eyes are on the South to see if cases start to rise over the summer, much like last year during the oppressive heat.

Here are some graphics that show everything trending down since January:

When I look at by regions, all regions are seeing downward trends, another good sign.

And drilling down into each regions to get miniature graphics for each states:

So far, everything looks good but I think the South is just a hair above the level they were last summer. For me, I won’t start feeling comfortable until the South successfully gets past the summer without a surge (since they have the lowest vaccinations levels and doctors are concerned about the prospect of another surge in the South during the hot summer months) and the US gets past the fall without a surge. Those are the two points that will indicate if the vaccinations have successfully beaten the variants before the variants could get a strong foothold in the communities.

Washington Post had an article saying that these positive signs that I just showed you may be deceiving because those who have not been vaccinated are being infected and landing in hospitals at the same levels as January, a time at which the virus was rampaging through our communities at a pretty ferocious level.

For a lot of people, it’s too early to celebrate.

And then around the world there appears to be mixed signs. South America is not doing well, especially Brazil, Argentina and Colombia. India appears to have reached the peak but that signal may be false: I keep reading stories about the rural areas being devastated by the virus because health care is practically non-existent. About 60 or 65% of the population live in the rural areas and I suspect they are mostly poor. If health care is non-existent, then there can’t be much testing going on to indicate if a sick person has covid or not. The articles indicate that the numbers being reported may be grossly understated due to this lack of health care. I just keep reading how the virus is just ripping through families.

Europe appears to be doing better but I’m getting mixed signals from the news because of the variants that are showing up. So I don’t know about Europe: sometimes I think it is on the verge of surging upwards again.

Let’s cross our fingers and hope we make it through the summer and fall, despite those highly contagious variants.

But life sure feels a lot brighter.