Thread by @TheLawyerCraig

Arizona was the first state to show sharp rises during the 2020 summer wave. In fact, we already saw movement by this time last year. So here's a thread comparing AZ's 2020 and 2021 trends. I looked at the 2021 7DA ending 6/11 v. 5/21 and 2020 7DA ending 6/12 v. 5/22.

🧵thread🧵

First, I used a 3-week comparison to place 2020 and 2021 on as even a footing as possible. Memorial Day 2020 was 5/25, so using 1 or 2 weeks would have placed Memorial Day in either 2021's or 2020's comparisons. Not good. Also, all % changes are weekly, not for the 3-week period.

2020

(5/22 ➡️ 6/12; metrics are 7-day avgs)

Cases: 348 ➡️ 1,227 (+84.0% weekly)
Tests: 8,121 ➡️ 12,092 (+16.3%)
% Pos: 4.29% ➡️ 10.14% (+45.5%)
Hosp: 802 ➡️ 1,277 (+19.7%)
ICU: 319 ➡️ 412 (+9.6%)
Deaths: 17.7 ➡️ 18.9 (+2.2%)

Significant 2020 increases (except lagging deaths).

2021

(5/21 ➡️ 6/11; metrics are 7-day avgs)

Cases: 535 ➡️ 400 (-8.4% weekly)
Tests: 16,552 ➡️ 14,847 (-3.4%)
% Pos: 3.23% ➡️ 2.69% (-5.6%)
Hosp: 591 ➡️ 571 (-1.2%)
ICU: 186 ➡️ 143 (-7.6%)
Deaths: 12.0 ➡️ 9.6 (-6.7%)

Down across all metrics, though not precipitous drops.

2021 is leagues better than 2020 so far. That's good news. But I think it makes sense to look at what the US did during those two periods as well. After all, whether AZ outperformed or underperformed the US trends (and by how much) certainly matters too.

US 2020

(5/22 ➡️ 6/12; metrics are 7-day avgs)

Cases: 22,402 ➡️ 21,463 (-1.4% weekly)
Tests: 413,544 ➡️ 457,303 (+3.5%)
% Pos: 5.42% ➡️ 4.69% (-4.5%)
Hosp: 41,691 ➡️ 35,924 (-4.6%)
ICU: 9,603 ➡️ 7,956 (-5.7%)
Deaths: 1,192 ➡️ 995 (-5.5%)

So, while the US showed a ~5% decline in the metrics in from 5/22 to 6/12 in 2020, Arizona was rocketing upwards in pretty much every metric except deaths, which take a while to find their way to the reporting. Clearly a sharp divergence between the two.

Let's see about 2021...

US 2021

(5/21 ➡️ 6/11; metrics are 7-day avgs)

Cases: 26,142 ➡️ 13,065 (-16.7% weekly)
Tests: 1,109,588 ➡️ 816,297 (-8.8%)
% Pos: 2.36% ➡️ 1.60% (-10.7%)
Hosp: 26,853 ➡️ 17,614 (-11.5%)
ICU: 5,842 ➡️ 3,725 (-12.1%)
Deaths: 574 ➡️ 412 (-9.4%)

2021 shows a bit of a divergence, with AZ generally hanging around the single-digit decline range (~4-6%), while the US is about double that (~9-12%). Of course, we're not the same ballpark of the delta between US & AZ trends in 2020. I'll take those numbers.

Here's @Hold2LLC's graphic look at AZ spanning a much larger timeframe. *Note that our actual numbers will differ because he's using actual rather than reported dates (for cases and deaths), but I suspect the trends line up quite nicely:

https://twitter.com/Hold2LLC/status/1403755803987922946?s=20

We'll see what the coming weeks bring, but if the 2021 southern summer stimulus is essentially just a flatter decline in a dozen or so states, I will absolutely take that and run.

Just realized my formula was off in the quoted tweet and pulled 6/2 instead of 6/12 for 2020. It doesn't change much since we were comparing it to a skyrocketing AZ anyway (and now 2020 AZ looks worse!), but I'll update the numbers in the tweet below this.

https://twitter.com/TheLawyerCraig/status/1403762179699052551?s=20

*UPDATED* US 2020

(5/22 ➡️ 6/12; metrics are 7-day avgs)

Cases: 22,402 ➡️ 20,155 (-3.3% weekly)
Tests: 413,544 ➡️ 484,193 (+5.7%)
% Pos: 5.42% ➡️ 4.16% (-7.7%)
Hosp: 41,691 ➡️ 30,743 (-8.8%)
ICU: 9,603 ➡️ 6,352 (-11.3%)
Deaths: 1,192 ➡️ 753 (-12.3%)