COVID Update: What we’re still doing wrong that must be fixed.

And I think people who care need to see this. And I will explain this graph. 1/
We have vaccinated 10-20% of the people we committed to vaccinating.

This is absolutely below normal error levels and nothing tells me Trump or team cares enough to fix it. #PromisesNeverKept 2/
There’s a new strain of the virus everywhere. You discover this by sequencing the virus. The UK has sequenced 78,000 samples. The US— 400.

This is dismal. It’s here & has been for a time. And we failed. 3/
The impact of the new strain could be profound. Presuming it’s as contagious as we think— here’s one model Bill Joy put together.

-the lowest line is the projected recovery assuming current vaccine rollout & compliance. 4/
Since we don’t know how many cases are from the new strain, the graphs make various assumptions about how many cases there were of the new strain in early December. The blue line is if there are a lot more than we knew. The green line is if there were just a small amount. 5/
But this makes our recovery slower & worse. But we don’t know. Trump filled the government with geniuses who tried to convince us that virus didn’t matter. 6/
Scott Atlas is the Josh Haley of Rudy Giuliani’s. #AssoftheYearStillUpForGrabs

7/
Will the vaccine work on the new strain? Yes, but probably not as well.

Scientists tell me the South African strain did something fairly astonishing. I will explain this... 8/
The shape of the spike protein evolved but still binds to the Ace-2 cell.

If someone has a clearer explanation, leave it below please. Thank you. 9/
The implication of this is that the vaccine is likely to work but not as well as they did in the trials. That has 2 implications for vaccine distribution. And if you see point 1– we are failing and this failure is now compounding. 10/
We need to vaccinate more quickly to fight this evolution.

We need to start considering covering more people with their first dose before everyone with 2 doses.

We need to get our heads out of our rears in terms of who we are vaccinating. 11/
Let me explain the third point. Almost every state I’ve spoken with has told me we are vaccinating 25 year old dental students before elderly people in nursing homes.

We need to vaccinate people at highest risk of hospitalizations. This is an operational & moral failure. 12/
Incompetence mixed with indifference is a deadly blend.

And each state is doing it differently. No one knows when they will get vaccinated. It’s slow and disorganized. 13/
If there’s a way to take a highly effective vaccine & mess it up, welcome to the Trump Administration.

And the response from them— we’re done. 14/
And what about Mr. “I stopped all travel from China.” No. You didn’t.

And you left a gaping hole for UK travel. So this strand. Which of these curves is it on? The one where we will have 300,000 or 400,000 cases/day at peak? 15/
How many more Trump deaths will spill over into Biden Harris? A lot. 16/
And because of no investment in vaccine hesitancy & communication, we will have a risk that the drop in that curve we need to see could stall. 17/
Incompetence in normal times is one thing. But incompetence during a pandemic has a longer half-life. Trump has made 2021 harder and painted a much harder scenario for Biden-Harris. 18/
You will notice on this graph that we can and will recover. The question is the cost in our lives. And there’s 22 days for them to screw more things up. #BringInTheGrownUps. /end

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More from @ASlavitt

31 Dec 20
COVID Update Year End, 2020: 2020 is what happens when a society reaps what it has sown for many years.

2021 we have the opportunity to begin a painfully slow build back.

WARNING: Last 2020 thread: not all fun & games. But neither was 2020. 1/
Look around. If you see much at all, you might see closed store fronts, it’s angry people, it’s worried & lonely and frustrated friends & neighbors. And it’s millions in a deeper kind of lonely mourning. 2/
Look around. If you look, you might see a soaring stock market, the lowest taxes in memory, billions in new wealth, excessive gifts & advantages to those who don’t need them. 3/
Read 25 tweets
26 Dec 20
COVID Update December 26: The wind is invisible too, but you can feel it change.

Not with COVID where the stillness is deceptive. And deadly. 1/
I talked to a friend this morning who last week told me with joy and relief that her grandmother was in a nursing home in CA that had zero cases.

“They’re being sooo good,” she said. 2/
I talked with her this morning & her grandmother & 7 other of the 14 people in the facility have COVID now.

“They were so safe up until now,” she told me. She was shaken and scared. 3/
Read 25 tweets
24 Dec 20
Answer to question why is the “English” COVID strain in the UK & not the US?

Simple. Because the UK has surveillance testing & the US still doesn’t. 1/
The Trump Administration had plenty of opportunity to build a national testing strategy with surveillance testing for THE LAST ELEVEN MONTHS $ chose not to. 2/
Instead Trump decided that we were “testing too much” and it was making him look bad. 3/
Read 6 tweets
23 Dec 20
COVID Update December 22: Yesterday I wrote a tweet thread about bottling up my own anger.

But I also have tons of hope. On my #inthebubble with Tony Fauci tomorrow am, you will see why. 1/
Yes one reason is science. Tony represents the reason you invest in science regardless of the administration and regardless of whether we are worried about taxes & deficits. 2/
Investing in science is an investment in each other. An investment in our future. And it cuts against all the excesses of capitalism. 3/
Read 21 tweets
22 Dec 20
COVID Update December 21: 2020 has been filled with such a strong assortment of emotions, facts, and politics.

And I’ve tried the best I could to find & summarize the right facts in these threads. But there’s more going on that I haven’t captured. But I will try now. 1/
As a country it became clear to most of us at some point that you can’t get through a pandemic very well as a divided nation. That all the division that had been brewing for years was coming back to haunt us. 2/
That every bit of indifference to the plight of others, every time we didn’t do everything we could to make people less likely to suffer, every selfish instinct— were all coming bone to roost. And in the worst possible ways— with people’s lives. 3/
Read 27 tweets
20 Dec 20
Morning update on COVID news.

Vaccine rollout
Senate package
New strain in UK
More data/California 1/
Vaccine rollout.

Trump Administration have problems counting how many Pfizer vaccines they have & where & when they go. Will fail to send committed amounts on time to states. 2/
Governors are annoyed & trying to be patient. Delay will be weeks not months from what I hear.

This sounds sloppy. But kinks are to be expected. Moderna vaccine begins to ship. 3/
Read 12 tweets

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