Strange stories about Putin – Biden’s bid for re-election – COVID precautions in decline, both home and abroad – Difficulties in collecting COVID data – Evening statistics
There are rumors that Putin is ill. Some of these claim that he is actually dying, but it is impossible to tell one way or the other. The Kremlin would not release such information even if it were true, and the Ukrainian sources naturally have a bias in the opposite direction. If he is indeed dying and the state of his health became known, the campaign against Ukraine would be seriously undermined. Perhaps North Korea itself offers fewer obstacles to reliable information about its national affairs than Russia. There is some footage showing Putin visibly limping in Sevastopol at the ceremonies celebrating the ninth year of Crimea’s annexation. But that, of course, may only be a temporary condition and in any case is not necessarily a sign of mortal illness. Denmark’s military intelligence service believes that Putin probably does not have a terminal illness at all, although it claims to have information to the effect that Putin has been given hormone treatments for cancer in recent months. He has good reason, other than health issues, for looking grim and concerned. Russian economy has suffered greatly from the war, not least on account of the number of young men diverted from the work force: about one million men have been drafted and an additional million have fled the country to avoid being drafted.
We are not in a position to cast stones at a nation whose leader may be too old or disabled to fulfill the functions of his office, for Biden has recently announced he has decided to run for a second term and will formally announce his re-election campaign “relatively soon.” I can only hope that the Democrats will have the sense to nominate a different candidate. He is not what might be called an inspiring figure. Biden’s approval ratings are stuck in the low 40s, and if elected he would be 86 by the end of a second term, nine years older than the average U.S. male life expectancy. To be fair, his would-be competitor is a mere four years younger than he and in addition is currently besieged by numerous lawsuits that reflect on him disgrace rather than credit. But even so, the Democrats would do well to show a little foresight and to stop clinging to so many of their antediluvian representatives in both the executive and legislative branches, whose age could almost be expressed in geological terms.
What is the status of COVID amid these domestic and international furors? Very far removed from the public radar at this point. From both national and international localities I can cull only a few examples:
“I’m hoping it’s true that we are getting to more where COVID is like flu, is like RSV (respiratory syncytial virus),” said Dr. Leisha Nolen, an epidemiologist for Utah’s Department of Health and Human Services. Utah is planning to stop reporting case counts next month, although other data will continue to be updated weekly. Abroad the indications are the most people are similarly inured to the presence of the disease. Singapore recently saw an upsurge of nearly double the amount of COVID cases this past week, as compared to the week before, but “cases are mostly mild,” according to its Ministry of Health, and Singapore has no plans to reinstate the mandates it dropped in February. India has also seen a substantial increase in COVID cases, but the mortality remains at 1.19%: significant, but not worse than many other diseases that are now relegated to the “endemic” status.
And of course the data being reported are undergoing continual revision. Recently Florida removed more than 32,000 COVID cases from its reported tally, a decrease of about 17%. No explanation was given for the decrease, but other metrics suggest that this modification is justified. In March the number of COVID-related hospitalizations was 830 throughout the state, much lower that a total of nearly 3,000 reported in January. The health officials of California’s Sonoma County reported that local COVID statistics are no longer reliable due to dramatic decreases in laboratory testing. As of April 13th there were 19 COVID-related hospitalizations in the country. But local health officials have repeatedly pointed out that many of those cases are what is considered “incidental COVID-19,” where patients seeking care at a local hospital, for some other condition or procedure, also tested positive for the virus.
So with all of these caveats to be borne in mind, the daily statistics that I glean from various sources must be treated with caution. Here they are nonetheless: # of cases worldwide: 685,600,450; # of deaths worldwide: 6,842,351; # of cases U.S.: 106,464,679; # of deaths; U.S.: 1,158,158. If COVID were to retain the death rate seen in the last week, it would be about twice as deadly as influenza in the U.S. But this is much better than the rate it had when it first came out; in 2020 it claimed more than 16 times the number of people who succumbed to influenza.