July 16, 2020
Thursday
Last night, I saw one of my "gothy" teenage neighbors walking her bearded dragon around the court on a leash. When I say walking, it was more like picking up the lizard, putting it down, and then waiting for it to walk (which it did not seem interested in doing) and then picking it up again. It felt very much like a living metaphor for what we are experiencing. You may want this virus to go away. You may attempt to ignore it. But in the end, we will have to embrace the hard work if we're going to mitigate death and disability. In other words, no matter how badly my neighbor wanted to walk her lizard on a leash, she ended up carrying the animal home. Reality is what reality is.
(PS I may or may not have used my 400mm lens to take pictures of the "bearded dragon walking show." I mean, if you are at your desk and you have your camera for capturing birds at the ready, there is nothing creepy about taking pictures of other animals, right?)
---Latest Data---
https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus-data-explorer?yScale=log&zoomToSelection=true&time=2020-04-16..&country=USA~GBR~CAN~BRA~AUS~IND~DEU~FRA~ITA~SWE&deathsMetric=true&dailyFreq=true&aligned=true&perCapita=true&smoothing=7
FT data - the second graph down now has state-level data - I suggest setting it to cases, per million, linear, and add your state to the highlighted list.
https://ig.ft.com/coronavirus-chart/?areas=usa&areas=gbr&cumulative=0&logScale=1&perMillion=0&values=deaths
The NY Times has hotspot map is an excellent quick glace of rolling 2-week case change: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/coronavirus-us-cases.html
State Details:
https://public.tableau.com/views/Coronavirus-ChangeovertimeintheUSA/2_Corona?:display_count=y&:origin=viz_share_link
Rt data: https://rt.live/
COVID risk by US county: https://globalepidemics.org/key-metrics-for-covid-suppression/
Each of the above sites reports its source data. Please review sources like https://covidtracking.com/ to understand the quality of that data.
------------
On our team COVID Q&A yesterday, Mark T. asked about hyper-local risk data. Here is the best, timely county-level data I am aware of:
COVID risk by US county: https://globalepidemics.org/key-metrics-for-covid-suppression/
The topic of vaccines - different types of vaccines and their various countries of origin - came up on the call as well. Here are some resources:
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/science/coronavirus-vaccine-tracker.html
or
https://www.statnews.com/feature/coronavirus/drugs-vaccines-tracker/
More on removing CDC from its role as a COVID data aggregator:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/14/us/politics/trump-cdc-coronavirus.html
John Ioannidis is the Stanford professor who seems to have a strong desire to downplay the severity of COVID by finding undiagnosed immune reactive patients - in essence, widening the denominator pool, so numerators mean less - published another article on Tuesday. The study has numerous methodologic and logical problems. The Twittersphere of epidemiologists, policy folks, and physicians had some not nice things to say. The threads offer great examples of intellectual fallacy and bias:
https://twitter.com/AVG_Joseph96/status/1283234509639618560
and
https://twitter.com/GidMK/status/1283232023402868737
Universal mask use in the healthcare environment has more data supporting it, from a Harvard medical school teaching hospital.
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2768533
Here is a press release about the article that is a bit more consumer-friendly:
https://www.brighamandwomens.org/about-bwh/newsroom/press-releases-detail?id=3608
And more commentary from Dr. Redfield of the CDC wrote an editorial supporting the above universal masking article. The most valuable data, however, are the references provided. The references are a ROADMAP OF ARTICLES AND DATA regarding the evidence for using face masks.
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2768532
And then you have this ridiculous hair-splitting - "strongly encouraging but not mandating" the use of masks by executive order.
https://twitter.com/i/events/1283620361477619712
Somehow Chuck Woolery (the retired TV game show host) made it back onto the national stage, and not in a good way. I sincerely hope his son is OK. His comments end up being the equivalent of a Twitter Haiku, two tweets in two days, book-ending the entire spectrum of "belief" in the coronavirus discussion. I rarely have such a rapidly evolving range of thoughts around one person. It started with, "huh, he's still around?" To: "Wow, what a foolish thing to say" and rapidly evolved to "Oh dear, that is not good. I hope his family is OK." in a mere 36 hours.
https://twitter.com/DocBastard/status/1283189755262521348
Here is a twitter thread by a physician about physicians (and others) who have had major complications from mild to moderate coronavirus infections. These are the consequences of which I am most concerned. https://twitter.com/MichelleDangMD/status/1283086871715876871
Welcome to the age of personal hazmat suits. I do and don't want one of these all at the same time.
https://www.bloombergquint.com/pursuits/biovyzr-hazmat-suits-aim-to-make-flying-safer-during-coronavirus
Infographic of the day: I do not know where this graphic came from, but it feeds my fascination with extinct megafauna:
https://i.redd.it/p753tunpiya51.jpg
What struck me was the "hell pig," which was an animal I learned about recently. The Hell Pig is an Entelodont. Entelodonts have no direct descendants in modern fauna but appear to be a mix of a pig, bear, and hyena. If you want to "Jurassic Park" an animal for commercial breeding (and a Netflix show), you should consider the Hell Pig. I will warn you, though, it seems like a worse idea than breeding cassowaries.
Learn more! https://youtu.be/ZHv12XqM7lE
Infographic of the day #2 - Cosmic Exploration. I don't know if I want this on my wall, but it is cool to zoom in and look around online.
https://popchart.co/products/the-chart-of-cosmic-exploration
-----Bonus Round - Social commentary through art
The anonymous street/graffiti artist Banksy has a long history of political commentary street art. Of course, his pseudo-anonymous status and the fact that his art is often quickly removed only add to his mystique. I found this article about his recent work on the London Underground regarding his support of the use of masks. Please take a look at the related content for my favorite of his previous work - the self-shredding painting.
http://www.openculture.com/2020/07/banksy-strikes-again-in-london-urges-everyone-to-wear-masks.html
Background: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banksy
Jean-Michel Basquiat was a complex artist. A multilingual New Yorker of Haitian and Puerto Rican descent, he wrestled with mental illness and heroin addiction throughout his short life. As a found graffiti artist, he made his way from homelessness to the highest circles of the 1980's art world. His work is a messy and often rough mix of commentary of politics, race, economic disparity, and culture. His trademark was painting in Armani suits and then appearing in public in the paint-splattered suits at exhibitions.
See his work: https://www.wikiart.org/en/jean-michel-basquiat
Background: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Michel_Basquiat#Criticism
1996 biographical movie with lots of famous actors: https://www.amazon.com/Basquiat-Dennis-Hopper/dp/B00BAHL5TC
Clean hands and sharp minds, team
-AW
Last night, I saw one of my "gothy" teenage neighbors walking her bearded dragon around the court on a leash. When I say walking, it was more like picking up the lizard, putting it down, and then waiting for it to walk (which it did not seem interested in doing) and then picking it up again. It felt very much like a living metaphor for what we are experiencing. You may want this virus to go away. You may attempt to ignore it. But in the end, we will have to embrace the hard work if we're going to mitigate death and disability. In other words, no matter how badly my neighbor wanted to walk her lizard on a leash, she ended up carrying the animal home. Reality is what reality is.
(PS I may or may not have used my 400mm lens to take pictures of the "bearded dragon walking show." I mean, if you are at your desk and you have your camera for capturing birds at the ready, there is nothing creepy about taking pictures of other animals, right?)
---Latest Data---
https://ourworldindata.org/coronavirus-data-explorer?yScale=log&zoomToSelection=true&time=2020-04-16..&country=USA~GBR~CAN~BRA~AUS~IND~DEU~FRA~ITA~SWE&deathsMetric=true&dailyFreq=true&aligned=true&perCapita=true&smoothing=7
FT data - the second graph down now has state-level data - I suggest setting it to cases, per million, linear, and add your state to the highlighted list.
https://ig.ft.com/coronavirus-chart/?areas=usa&areas=gbr&cumulative=0&logScale=1&perMillion=0&values=deaths
The NY Times has hotspot map is an excellent quick glace of rolling 2-week case change: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/coronavirus-us-cases.html
State Details:
https://public.tableau.com/views/Coronavirus-ChangeovertimeintheUSA/2_Corona?:display_count=y&:origin=viz_share_link
Rt data: https://rt.live/
COVID risk by US county: https://globalepidemics.org/key-metrics-for-covid-suppression/
Each of the above sites reports its source data. Please review sources like https://covidtracking.com/ to understand the quality of that data.
------------
On our team COVID Q&A yesterday, Mark T. asked about hyper-local risk data. Here is the best, timely county-level data I am aware of:
COVID risk by US county: https://globalepidemics.org/key-metrics-for-covid-suppression/
The topic of vaccines - different types of vaccines and their various countries of origin - came up on the call as well. Here are some resources:
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/science/coronavirus-vaccine-tracker.html
or
https://www.statnews.com/feature/coronavirus/drugs-vaccines-tracker/
More on removing CDC from its role as a COVID data aggregator:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/14/us/politics/trump-cdc-coronavirus.html
John Ioannidis is the Stanford professor who seems to have a strong desire to downplay the severity of COVID by finding undiagnosed immune reactive patients - in essence, widening the denominator pool, so numerators mean less - published another article on Tuesday. The study has numerous methodologic and logical problems. The Twittersphere of epidemiologists, policy folks, and physicians had some not nice things to say. The threads offer great examples of intellectual fallacy and bias:
https://twitter.com/AVG_Joseph96/status/1283234509639618560
and
https://twitter.com/GidMK/status/1283232023402868737
Universal mask use in the healthcare environment has more data supporting it, from a Harvard medical school teaching hospital.
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2768533
Here is a press release about the article that is a bit more consumer-friendly:
https://www.brighamandwomens.org/about-bwh/newsroom/press-releases-detail?id=3608
And more commentary from Dr. Redfield of the CDC wrote an editorial supporting the above universal masking article. The most valuable data, however, are the references provided. The references are a ROADMAP OF ARTICLES AND DATA regarding the evidence for using face masks.
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2768532
And then you have this ridiculous hair-splitting - "strongly encouraging but not mandating" the use of masks by executive order.
https://twitter.com/i/events/1283620361477619712
Somehow Chuck Woolery (the retired TV game show host) made it back onto the national stage, and not in a good way. I sincerely hope his son is OK. His comments end up being the equivalent of a Twitter Haiku, two tweets in two days, book-ending the entire spectrum of "belief" in the coronavirus discussion. I rarely have such a rapidly evolving range of thoughts around one person. It started with, "huh, he's still around?" To: "Wow, what a foolish thing to say" and rapidly evolved to "Oh dear, that is not good. I hope his family is OK." in a mere 36 hours.
https://twitter.com/DocBastard/status/1283189755262521348
Here is a twitter thread by a physician about physicians (and others) who have had major complications from mild to moderate coronavirus infections. These are the consequences of which I am most concerned. https://twitter.com/MichelleDangMD/status/1283086871715876871
Welcome to the age of personal hazmat suits. I do and don't want one of these all at the same time.
https://www.bloombergquint.com/pursuits/biovyzr-hazmat-suits-aim-to-make-flying-safer-during-coronavirus
Infographic of the day: I do not know where this graphic came from, but it feeds my fascination with extinct megafauna:
https://i.redd.it/p753tunpiya51.jpg
What struck me was the "hell pig," which was an animal I learned about recently. The Hell Pig is an Entelodont. Entelodonts have no direct descendants in modern fauna but appear to be a mix of a pig, bear, and hyena. If you want to "Jurassic Park" an animal for commercial breeding (and a Netflix show), you should consider the Hell Pig. I will warn you, though, it seems like a worse idea than breeding cassowaries.
Learn more! https://youtu.be/ZHv12XqM7lE
Infographic of the day #2 - Cosmic Exploration. I don't know if I want this on my wall, but it is cool to zoom in and look around online.
https://popchart.co/products/the-chart-of-cosmic-exploration
-----Bonus Round - Social commentary through art
The anonymous street/graffiti artist Banksy has a long history of political commentary street art. Of course, his pseudo-anonymous status and the fact that his art is often quickly removed only add to his mystique. I found this article about his recent work on the London Underground regarding his support of the use of masks. Please take a look at the related content for my favorite of his previous work - the self-shredding painting.
http://www.openculture.com/2020/07/banksy-strikes-again-in-london-urges-everyone-to-wear-masks.html
Background: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banksy
Jean-Michel Basquiat was a complex artist. A multilingual New Yorker of Haitian and Puerto Rican descent, he wrestled with mental illness and heroin addiction throughout his short life. As a found graffiti artist, he made his way from homelessness to the highest circles of the 1980's art world. His work is a messy and often rough mix of commentary of politics, race, economic disparity, and culture. His trademark was painting in Armani suits and then appearing in public in the paint-splattered suits at exhibitions.
See his work: https://www.wikiart.org/en/jean-michel-basquiat
Background: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Michel_Basquiat#Criticism
1996 biographical movie with lots of famous actors: https://www.amazon.com/Basquiat-Dennis-Hopper/dp/B00BAHL5TC
Clean hands and sharp minds, team
-AW
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