Thread by @WILLisms

It has been 91 days since @GregAbbott_TX announced that Texas would reopen "100%" with no statewide mask mandate.

At the time, there was much weeping and gnashing of teeth about it. Many predictions of impending doom.

Turns out, Texas was fine.

Sure, it's the day after Memorial Day, so this will go up this week, but Texas reported 94 new "cases" today.

In the whole state.

That's the lowest since March 23.

Of 2020.

Today's 7-day average: lowest since April 7, 2020.

Back when testing hadn't really ramped up yet.

If you want to zoom out a bit, here's what the cases look like since the beginning of 2021.

I still see some arguing for continued masking and restrictions because we're "in the middle of a global pandemic!!!"

No. We aren't. It's over.

The case for been over for a while now.

The "positivity rate" is also plummeting. We haven't seen lower numbers in any of the data, going back to March 2020.

We're at all-time lows for the percentage of COVID-19 tests (molecular) coming back positive.

Texas hospital patients who also test positive for COVID-19 are at the kind of levels we saw before all incidental and asymptomatic positives began being included in the numbers in June of 2020.

Texas hospital beds occupied by people who also test positive for COVID-19: just 2.65%.

There's only one day in the data with a lower number (April 12, 2020).

The 7-day average is also rapidly approaching an all-time low.

Texas ICU patients who also test positive for COVID-19 are now at their lowest 7-day average since data collection began on April 11, 2020.

All three of the all-time lowest single-day numbers of COVID-19 ICU patients occurred in the past three days.

As far as deaths go, those trickle in over days and weeks and months (so this won't hold), but we're sitting at four straight days of zero COVID-19 deaths at the moment, and even as they get added over time, their general trend is also improving dramatically.

The 7-day average shows an initial rapid decline after Texas reopened 100% with no mask mandate, followed by a period of slow decline. The way the case/hospital/ICU numbers are currently collapsing, though, we're in store for another rapid decline.

22,268,133 COVID-19 vaccine doses have been administered to 12,792,216 Texans.

Vaccine uptake peaked in Texas in early April.

Note the Johnson & Johnson "pause" by the FDA/CDC. The 7-day average of vaccine doses administered has declined ever since.

The cumulative numbers hide the declining rates of daily doses administered, but as of today:

79.56% of Texans 65-and-up have received at least one dose, and 69.6% have been "fully" vaccinated.

Even with vaccine ubiquity, Texas is probably due for a mild rise in cases based on latitudinal seasonality, peaking in mid-July.

Any rise in any COVID-19 metric will likely lead to more teeth-gnashing advocacy for renewed shutdowns and mandates.

Some people will try to use the anticipated, seasonal case bump to reinstate mask mandates and delay school and cancel concerts and all the rest of it.

Don't let them.

If you're seeing people still wearing masks (or worse: forcing others to), or limiting capacity at events, or requiring hand sanitizer, or keeping stickers on the ground for distancing, or not ripping out their pointless plexiglass cages, they are truly disconnected from reality.

The only things that have bent any COVID-19 curve are seasonality and immunity.

None of the other stuff, none of the non-pharmaceutical interventions, none of the lockdowns or mandates or closures, did anything, although it may still take some time for people to accept that.

Masks have zero demonstrable benefits but many known harms.

This truth, not the crashing COVID metrics or vaccine ubiquity, should be why the neurotic mask coercion we've had over the past year should cease immediately and never, ever happen again.

Even as all the numbers continue to crash, these graphs are getting pretty stale, so this is probably my final Texas COVID-19 update for a while.

Most people inclined to follow me probably look at these data and say: "Duh, yeah, we know. It's over. Move on."

They're right.

*case for interventions has been over*

(not sure how that phrase fell out of the tweet)

I don't normally take requests, but this was sought by multiple folks, and it's interesting, so...

Cumulative vaccinated Texans versus the 7-day average of cases.

Vaccinated and "fully" vaccinated Texans (green and blue areas, respectively), plotted against cases (red line).

Further discussion on the vaccine vs. case situation in Texas:

Now with "cases," hospitalizations, ICU patients, and deaths all plotted against cumulative vaccinated Texans: