Here are today’s cases with a visual history of where we’ve been over the last 2 months.
Cases: 20026, 24.3%
The maps give the total cases per 100k persons in each GA county on Dec 1, Jan 1, and today. Pretty stunning, huh??
2/ Today’s other news is a whopping death report.
135 deaths reported today
Our max - ever - was 190 on 9/18.
Hard to interpret bcs of how deaths get reported, often delayed by wks.
By date of death, highest was 139 on 1/20/21. In this wave highest so far was 52 on 1/11
3/ Finally, the kids …
Decline in cases appears steepest in 18-59 yo
Among children, only <1 yo declining some, while 5-9 still going ⬆️⬆️ & 1-4 ⬆️but slower. Highest numbers in 10-17 yo w maybe a hint of slowing - too soon to tell.
What to make of #COVID Ag tests still + at d 8,10,12, etc? There seem to be a lot of them - no data, just anecdotes. But also no data: predictive value of Ag+ for infectious omicron at these time pts. What advice do we give these folks? Don’t test? Isolate? Go to work?
2/ Good evidence that Ag+ = infectious virus for diagnosis. And @CDCDirector@RWalensky initially said the tests weren’t approved for ending isolation. She’s right, & there aren’t robust data on this (to my knowledge - but educate me, please!) We need these data! #IDTwitter
3/ Pre-omicron viral dynamics (from the NBA) showed rapid viral decline, w vaxxed ppl clearing virus faster than unvaxxed (mean 5.5d v 7.5d). This suggests not likely infectious 10+ day time points. nejm.org/doi/full/10.10…
1/ My first patient with AIDS was a young Black man - young enough to be the oldest on a pediatric ward - with wasting, diarrhea, fevers. Dx=DMAC. He died without a official diagnosis of AIDS. I was on my first clinical rotation in medical school. It was 1982.
2/ My last pt w HIV/AIDS during training was a young Black woman who presented to the ER with “asthma” that did not clear in the “asthma room” and who had PCP on bronchoscopy. She had had only one relationship.
3/ Many of my patients @GradyHealth with HIV/AIDS were Black in those early days. Some were Latinx. The myth of “gay white” AIDS has never been true, and that has cost many lives and worsened stigma.
Deaths: 137 reported today
• Highest ever
• First time above 100
• Probably some wkend backlog, but all the same...
• When are we going to implement science-based policies in Georgia, @GovKemp?
2/
Cases back above 3k again (3639) after weekend underreporting.
It's notable that there's a difference of > 900 cases between the ELR+, upon which % poz is calculated, and the reported cases for the day. This leads me to think that % poz is being underestimated.
3/
New hosp back up: 355
• Current hosp 2881
• Awaiting hosp capacity data for the day...more later.