Follow the Leader

Finally, a post title I don't have to explain to the young'uns. At least, I don't think I do.

Ah, what a difference a year makes. We're still stuck with good old Dr. Anthony Fauci, who keeps telling us to follow the science, but whose "science" runs around like a chicken with its head cut off (credit to you, Mitch). We still occasionally hear from former Surgeon General Jerome Adams, who now says we should have been wearing masks all along, and still should be. And once in a while, Admiral Giroir even makes an appearance - he of Operation Warp Speed fame.

But you know who we never see? Dr. Deborah Birx, who has a lovely scarf for every day of the year, it seems. Dr. Birx made good on her promise to fade away into the sunset. Of course, that's easy when you've been publicly embarrassed after telling everyone to stay home for Thanksgiving, then you and your extended family travel to Maryland for a big holiday get-together. Of course, rather than just own it, she said it was to get the house ready to sell (because, you know, the 'rona spreads over a turkey dinner, but not a home renovation, even with the same number of people in the same proximity), and then complained about how perfectly awful and unfair the media scrutiny was.

However, Dr. Birx did leave us with one construct that maybe we can get some use out of today. Remember how, during the Task Force press briefings, she would always tell us that they were watching what was happening in other countries where the virus had struck earlier, to see what "the curve" would look like in the U.S.? That those countries were like a leading indicator, and the U.S. would naturally follow? Even though our population density, demographics, health care quality, etc. was different than many of those countries?

Ah well, perhaps we can derive some useful information from looking at the data from some other countries, and projecting just where the U.S. might be in the whole progression of the dreaded Delta variant. (Is it even legal to say "Delta variant" without using the adjective "dreaded" in front of it?)

As you may recall, the Delta variant (apparently, it is legal) first revealed itself in India in February, some six months ago. Within a couple of months, it was the dominant strain in that country, which saw case numbers reach a level four times the previous high in May, three months after Delta first showed up there.

It's important to note that less than 7% of India's population is fully vaccinated. Remember that number.

So how is India faring now? With such a low vaccination rate, and such a large population (1.4 billion people, or more than four times the U.S. population), Delta has to be running rampant now, right? I mean, with a population density 12 times that of the U.S., all those people basically living on top of each other, a high poverty rate with many people living in squalor, and one of the lowest vaccination rates in the world, the May peak in daily new cases of around 400,000 has to have been dwarfed by now, right?

Take a look:

Gee, where did Delta go? After peaking in May, daily new cases began to decline as rapidly as they had increased, falling to about 30,000 as of late - still higher than just prior to Delta's emergence, but very low for a country with a billion-plus inhabitants. And it's not like it's because of vaccination progress. Nor because of lockdowns; India began reopening in June, when the numbers were rapidly declining. And they've kept right on declining.

Delta next reared its ugly head in the UK, rapidly becoming the leading variant there. Everyone thought Boris Johnson was mad as a hatter, to use a bit of Brit slang, for leaving the country open as Delta raged. Delta ramped up in late May and June, and daily new cases topped 54,000 in mid-July, nearly equal to the January, Alpha variant, pre-vaccine peak. (Note that the UK vaccination rate is among the highest in the world, at 55% fully vaccinated - so based on the UK and India data, a country's vaccination rate appears to have little effect on whether Delta persists.)

In any event, what happened to Delta in the UK after mid-July? Again, take a look:

Daily new cases have dropped steadily. They're not yet down to pre-Delta levels, but they're certainly headed that way. Based on the trajectory, they will be by the end of August.

So in largely unvaccinated India, Delta ran its course in about five months, after peaking in about three. In the UK, Delta took about two months to peak (maybe because Johnson kept the country open, whereas much of India shut down, so it may have taken a bit longer to spread), and will likely have run its course in about four months, tops.

Before we look at the U.S. data, let's note that deaths in India did spike in line with the spike in Delta cases, but that's the only place in the world where that's true, and it's probably because of a) the low vaccination rate, which may have resulted in more serious cases; b) limited access to health care for many of the country's poor, especially in remote areas; and c) co-morbidities due to diet and other factors, vitamin D deficiencies, etc. In the UK, however, deaths barely increased. In any event, they're back down now in India, and also lower in the UK. See below:

So now, let's look at the U.S. data. Where have daily new cases been trending since Delta arrived in the U.S. in May, and now that it accounts for more than 80% of new cases? Take a look:

In case your eye can't discern the small and recent, but clear, drop from the peak in daily new cases, here are the numbers. The peak was 69,382 on July 23, and the most recent number was 36,344, on July 26. Now, three days doth not a trend make, but it sure looks like we may have seen the peak in Delta cases, and that this thing looks a lot like what we see from the India and UK data. If we follow the advice of Dr. Birx, that seems to be the reasonable conclusion.

And yet -

The CDC, the least trusted three letters in the world today, has reversed its mask guidance to the following:

Even fully vaccinated people should wear masks indoors in places with high Covid transmission rates.

Folks, if we are at the peak - and it appears we are - that's like handing out condoms at the baby shower. No, actually, it's like handing out condoms that have a bunch of pinholes poked in them, given the fact that masks are intended to limit the spread of much larger bacteria, and are about as effective at containing virus as condoms with holes in them are at ... well, you know.

Also, let's unpack this notion of "high transmission rates." What is the Covid transmission rate?

Well, here's the way you'd measure that. You'd trace the contacts of someone known to be infected with Covid, and determine how many of those people became infected after coming into contact with that person. (Of course, you'd have to account for anyone else they might have come into contact with that was infected.) The number of people that the infected person transmitted the virus to, divided by the infected person's total contacts, would be the transmission rate.

Except it's impossible to measure that. And the CDC doesn't. So while they tell us to "follow the science," they use terms like "high transmission rate" that they can't define.

But wait - they do define it. How?

According to CNN (and I just threw up in my mouth a little at the thought of citing CNN), "The CDC considers a county to have high transmission if there have been 100 or more cases of Covid-19 per 100,000 residents or a test positivity rate of 10% or higher in the past seven days."

Okay, wait. Didn't the Curmudgeon already debunk positivity rates? Let's review. Who's getting tested these days?

1. People who are symptomatic and think they've got the virus, or show up at the doctor's office or hospital with symptoms.

2. People who have to get tested to board a cruise (if they're unvaccinated), a flight to certain countries, a return flight to the U.S., for some school or sports activity, for work, or to have some medical procedure performed.

Now, the positivity rate on cruises and flights has to be crazy low. If it weren't, it would be all over the news, and the CDC would ground the planes and dock the ships again. If the rate were high for any of those other things, we'd be reading about those hot spots the way we read about prisons and nursing homes and meat packing plants in 2020.

No, the people who are testing positive are the people who have symptoms and think they've got the 'rona. So the positivity rate is going to be artificially high, compared to what it would be if everyone in a given county got tested. (Go out and get tested - let's get that positivity rate down to where it should be, so they can't keep using a distorted number).

Now, what about the 100 cases per 100,000 residents statistic?

First, that's 0.1% of the population! Come on, people! Are you kidding me? We're going to diaper back up if 0.1% of the population get sick?

And second, that ignores population density, severity of the disease, or any other measure that could be of value.

Let's take my home county of Johnson County, Kansas. Here's some data straight from the CDC.

Johnson County is considered by the CDC to be a "high transmission" county. Why? Its positivity rate is only 7% - half what it was in January, and down from its mid-July peak:

Ah, but cases per 100,000 residents are a whopping 141 (about a third of what they were in January, but we're supposed to ignore that):

Is this serious? Are hospitals being overrun? Are we running out of ICU beds? Take a look:

Hospitalizations are falling, people. Bed use and ICU bed use for Covid is turning the corner, and in any event is below 6% for beds and below 17% for ICU beds. (I realize that hospitalizations and bed/ICU bed/ventilator use are high in Joplin and Springfield, Missouri, and perhaps in a handful of other locations in this very large country. My point is that the CDC is using the term "high transmission" very loosely. Johnson County, KS is not a hot spot, nor is practically every other county in the country. Even if we assume masks work, there aren't more than a dozen places in the U.S. where people should be donning them, and then only the unvaccinated, as there have been only about 5,000 serious breakthrough infections out of 160 million Americans fully vaccinated.)

What about deaths?

Gee, where'd they go? There have been 11 deaths attributed to the virus in Johnson County, KS since May 26. That's two months. There were nearly twice that many in the month of May alone.

Delta may be a super-spreader, but it ain't no killer. So why the masks?

I leave you with some data from bad ol' Florida, the left's favorite whipping-state. The aforementioned CNN (urp!) article states that "Florida and Arkansas currently share a grim distinction when it comes to the spread of the coronavirus." That distinction is that every county in those two states is defined as having a high rate of transmission by - you guessed it - the CDC.

Okay, let's look at cases in Florida, from a different source (note that Florida began tracking case data weekly, instead of daily, a while back):

Grim, indeed, yes? Weekly cases were negligible in early June, then about 2,200, then 12,600, then 43,400, then 71,700.

Yes, well ... no:

One death, back on June 11. Grim.

I'm guessing that within a couple of weeks, we're going to start seeing the case numbers come down in a way that's more visually evident. And that by September, Delta will just be an airline again.

In the meantime, hey, thanks Rach, for the recommendation. But I think I'll leave the mask at home.

Now, I've got a recommendation for you: instead of doing what the teachers' unions and whoever is making Joe Biden's decisions for him these days tell you what to do, do your job, pay attention to how this variant has actually progressed in other countries where it appeared earlier than it did in the U.S., what its mortality rate is, and base your recommendations on that. In other words -

Follow the science.

Post-script.

After sleeping on this post, I believe that the CDC et al know exactly what they're doing in this instance. I believe they did watch what happened with Delta in India and the UK. I believe they are watching the U.S. data closely. Of course they know this variant is far less deadly than previous variants, but they're not going to say that; they're perfectly happy to let the media and local health officials irresponsibly warn of impending mass deaths.

And, I believe they recognize that we're at the apex of the Delta curve, and that they expect the new case numbers to begin dropping. So why the new mask guidance now?

You figure it out.

That's right. When the cases do fall precipitously, they're going to credit the masks. They're going to say they worked. That way, they can keep masks in their arsenal, so during flu season, or when the next variant causes a slight increase in cases (but nowhere near January 2021 levels), even absent the risk of serious illness or death, they can once again justify exercising control over people's lives. "Hey, we know you got the flu vaccine, but you could still get a breakthrough infection and pass it on to someone else, so for the greater good, you need to mask up - look how masking stopped the Delta variant in its tracks!"

Oh, not all officials who put these mandates in place fall in this category. Take Kansas City, Missouri mayor Quinton Lucas, who will reinstate an indoor mask mandate the day of this writing. He's not smart enough to look at the data and formulate such a scheme. Doesn't have the forethought to think it through; he's just an empty suit. But he's a power-hungry despot with his eyes on a bigger political prize, and he'll use the CDC to wield his authority. The CDC is the enabler; he's the sheep. They hand him the bludgeon and he swings it. There are many more like him.

If we can get them to acquiesce when it comes to masks, it'll be that much easier to get them to acquiesce to the next, more intrusive thing. Socialism 101.

So remember, when the cases fall, and they crow about how effective the masks were, where you read it first.