6/30/20: When I did my final check for COVID-19 figures
for the month, CDC was reporting that we had
43,644 additional
infections
on June 30.
That brought the total for the month to 836,978
cases. Meaning: We did worse in June than May, when 23,394 Americans were
infected every 24 hours. June cases averaged 27,899 per day.
____________________
“You have an individual responsibility to
yourself, but you have a societal responsibility because if we want to end this
outbreak, really end it and then hopefully when a vaccine comes and puts a nail
in the coffin, we’ve got to realize that we are part of the process.”
Dr.
Anthony Fauci
____________________
In fact, there are countries that have flattened
the curve. But one of them is not the United States. You could check a story
from National Geographic, if you wanted to see the difference.
With July on the horizon, and under the
guiding hand of President Donald Trump, the U.S. remains #1 in terms of our ability
to ensure that large numbers of citizens pass to the Great Beyond in rapid
order.
As of June 30, we led the world, with 127,332
dead, more than
double the number in Brazil.
Our fearless and clueless leader remains in
denial. Mr. Trump spent the last days of June tweeting, golfing, and telling everyone
that the gloomy COVID-19 picture was in reality rosy.
In a call to Sean Hannity
he could be heard insisting that he was doing a magnificent job of
controlling the spread, especially because of his great border wall with
Mexico. If it weren’t for his big, beautiful wall (which is mostly incomplete)
the coronavirus “would be infecting lives like nobody’s ever seen before
[emphasis added].”
Hannity,
as is his style whenever he’s letting the president meander, didn’t question that
ludicrous statement.
“So, we have more
cases, because we do the greatest testing. If we didn’t do testing, we’d have
no cases. Other countries they don’t test millions,” the president assured the
gel-haired host. “If we didn’t do tests, we’d look great.”
Hannity didn’t question
that either.
That was Trump’s
brilliant new strategy. Don’t test and you won’t know Grandma has the virus. When
she ends up in the hospital, tell your kids, “Grandma didn’t die when she went
to ICU. She’s living on a farm in upstate New York, with a new family. And they
take great care of her.”
Trump wasn’t the only member of the team
trying to sell the American people a truckload of horse manure, and insist that
what it really was, was a load of Florida oranges. During his last press
conference, Vice President Pence said it was “good news” that more young people,
as a percentage of new cases, were being tested and showing up positive.
This was good news, he explained, because young
people were less likely to keel over dead after contracting the virus.
Pence also echoed the latest Trumpian line:
We’re looking bad because the numbers of cases are rising. But really, we’re
just doing a great job of testing.
In sad reality, where we are all reside, the fact
that the positivity rate – the
percentage of people tested who are infected – is rising is another worrisome sign.
According to Johns Hopkins University,
positivity rates are increasing in all but eight states (numbers checked on the
evening of June 30), with these states currently being hit hardest:
Arizona 24.4%
Florida 15.6%
Alabama 15.2%
Nevada 15.1%
Mississippi 14.1%
Texas 14.1%
South Carolina 13.7%
Georgia 11.7%
Utah 10.9%
(Once again: all of the “leaders” are red
states.)
Dr. Anthony Fauci, who can offer up the
unvarnished truth because he’s not running for reelection, is less sanguine. He
warned that we could not take infections in young people for granted, since they
obviously spread the disease. He added that we had to take mask-wearing and
social distancing seriously if we hoped to get the nation up and running. “You
have an individual responsibility to yourself,” he explained, “but you have a
societal responsibility because if we want to end this outbreak, really end it
and then hopefully when a vaccine comes and puts a nail in the coffin, we’ve
got to realize that we are part of the process.”
See, for comparison: President Trump
addressing a Tulsa rally, or a Phoenix gathering of “Students for Trump,” where
masks and social distancing were almost universally ignored.
 |
How many masks can you find? |
*
MEANWHILE, President Trump was tweeting out
the great news: “Our Economy is roaring back
and will NOT be shut down,” he promised. “‘Embers’ or flare ups [of the virus] will
be put out, as necessary!”
We
were roaring back!
Trump supporters and Trump foes, alike.
Or
not. If Texas were a country, it would have the
world’s tenth largest economy. That’s normally impressive, but bad news,
currently. The state is getting hammered by a surge of infections. On June 23, Texas surpassed the 5,000-mark for a single day for the
first time, then totaled more than 5,000 cases again on June 24, June 25, June
26, June 27, and June 28, dipped on June 29 slightly, and then set a record
with 6,975 cases on June 30. Bars were ordered to close again. Restaurants were
told to limit seating to 50% capacity.
Slowing national and world economies meant dropping
oil prices. Drilling across the state halted. Many wells were shut down for
good. If Texas is hurting (and as of now it is), the U.S. economy is hurting, and we’re all
in a leaking boat together. That goes for Trump supporters and Trump foes,
alike.
California would be the fifth largest economy
in the world, if it were a sovereign nation.
That state has also seen a resurgence of
disease; and the California economy is in “free fall.”
Same leaking boat analogy.
Thrown in Florida, which would be the world’s
seventeenth largest economy, if it were a country. Florida, where tourism fuels
the economy, is reeling. Last Friday, health officials in that state announced that 8,942 new cases had been confirmed in just 24 hours.
On Saturday, the state hit a new high, with 9,585 cases.
The economic damage has spread to every corner
of the country. This year’s Bonnaroo Music Festival, which brings 75,000 fans
to a farm near Manchester, Tennessee, and pumps millions of dollars into local,
state, and national economies, has been canceled. Chuck E. Cheese has filed for bankruptcy, putting a serious dent in the bad-pizza-for-kids’-birthday-parties
business. The NFL is operating under the assumption that attendance will be
limited once the season begins. The league is telling teams they can plan to
sell advertisements, placed on front row seats, since fans will (at best) have to be kept a
good distance from players.
Signs we’re in for a long down stretch are
multiplying. Homeowners protected by the CARES Act passed in March, can
postpone mortgage payments for 180 days without penalty. Interest on loans
continues to accrue, but they don’t lose homes. A total of 4.7 million
homeowners have taken advantage of the moratorium. They’ve piled up $1 trillion in unpaid principle that they someday must make good.
U.S. airlines and the entire U.S. travel
industry are about to suffer a devastating hit with the European Union banning most
travelers from the United States. The ban goes into effect July 1. Because…we’re
now one of the world’s hot spots for infection.
In other bad news, a record low 23% of teenagers, many hoping to save money for college, or
land summer jobs that might become permanent, will be able to find employment
this year.
*
ON TUESDAY, to end the month, the four health heads of the White House Coronavirus Task Force testified before a U.S. Senate committee. Dr. Fauci said he found current trends, “very disturbing.” He warned it was possible, if people continued to refuse to follow health guidelines, that we could hit 100,000 new cases per day.
“A great investment for the American people.”
Asked by Sen. Elizabeth Warren if he thought – like Mr. Pence and Mr. Trump – that we were going in the right direction, he replied,
Well I think the numbers speak
for themselves. I’m very concerned and I’m not satisfied with what’s going on
because we’re going in the wrong direction [emphasis added] if you look
at the curves of the new cases, so we really have got to do something about
that and we need to do it quickly.
Dr. Fauci, CDC Director Dr. Robert Redfield, FDA Commissioner Stephen Hahn and Admiral Brett Giroir, M.D. were asked if they thought all Americans should be wearing masks when out in public – should the federal government provide masks at no cost – and would this save thousands of lives?
Fauci: “Yes.”
Redfield: He said he was in favor of “universal masks.”
Hahn agreed.
Giroir: “Yes….When I’m not in uniform,” he said, “I wear them.” He held one up. “They’re white. They work very effective, and I think they’re a great investment for the American people.”
The gloomy predictions of the four experts angered Sen. Rand Paul. He went on a rant about the “fatal conceit” of expert opinion, small groups of highly-educated people, who wanted to tell the rest of us how to live.
At one point he glared at Dr. Fauci and asked almost plaintively, why we couldn’t just have “a little more optimism.”
BLOGGER’S NOTE: Editing this blog lightly on 12/6/20, these comments
almost shock. We were headed for much worse, more than 200,000 new cases daily
in December, and closing in on 300,000 dead. In retrospect, demanding “a little
more optimism” from the experts seems to be evidence of willful ignorance.
*
IN OTHER HEALTH-RELATED NEWS, Team Trump has
decided that the middle of a pandemic is a perfect time to push the U.S.
Supreme Court to blow Obamacare to smithereens.
If the court rules with Trump, and overturns
the entire law as he hopes, an estimated 20 million Americans could lose health insurance. If you have a
pre-existing condition, the protections you enjoy under the Affordable Care Act
will be eliminated. So, try not to get sick!
Wear that mask.
POSTSCRIPT: Brazil ends the month in second place, when it comes to most
infections and deaths from the coronavirus.
Like us, the Brazilian people are led by a virus denier, President Jair Bolsonaro. At a time when
Trump was insisting the U.S. was headed for “zero cases,” Bolsonaro was
tweeting videos of himself visiting shopping districts, and telling everyone to
take the unproven drug chloroquine, and they’d be fine.
This coronavirus…it was just a “little flu,” he said.
In fact, the last world leader Trump met with
before the virus began spreading unchecked in the U.S., was…Jair Bolsonaro, on
March 7…at a lavish party at Mar-a-Lago.
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