US daily numbers via @COVID19Tracking:
Newly reported deaths
Today: 2,527
Yesterday: 912
One week ago (4/28): 2,198
Newly reported cases:
T: 22K
Y: 21K
4/28: 24K
Newly reported tests:
T: 259K
Y: 232K
4/28: 201K
Positive test rate:
T: 9%
Y: 9%
4/28: 12%
Newly reported deaths
Today: 2,527
Yesterday: 912
One week ago (4/28): 2,198
Newly reported cases:
T: 22K
Y: 21K
4/28: 24K
Newly reported tests:
T: 259K
Y: 232K
4/28: 201K
Positive test rate:
T: 9%
Y: 9%
4/28: 12%
This was a very mixed bag. Tuesdays often result in spikes in deaths as states report data after weekend lags. This issue is getting bigger as NY (which did NOT have big week/weekend lags) is declining as a share of deaths. We had a BIG spike today to more than 2,500 deaths.
Perhaps more troubling though than the daily spike is the fact that we had more deaths in the past 7 days (12,782) than in the 7 days before that (12,054). Although the period two weeks ago was slightly worse (14,405).
On the other hand, the trend in the cases numbers is comparatively good, both on its own and (more importantly) as a share of tests. Today was the lowest positive test rate yet (8.6%), in fact, and we've been <10% for two days in a row.
Having done this for a while now, I would say two days is too soon to jump to any conclusions. If you see something for four or five days in a row, or say 7 days out of 8, then maybe we can start revising our priors.
