Morning statistics – Continued boldness of wildlife – Pipelines across the Appalachian Trail – FDA repudiates use of anti-malarial drugs for COVID-19 – Yet another Trump delusion – Outbreak in Beijing – News from Latin America – Evening statistics
Today’s statistics as of 8:00 AM — # of cases worldwide: 8,020,138; # of deaths worldwide: 436,167; # of cases U.S.: 2,162,406; # of deaths U.S.: 117,859. The case count has increased by over a million within eight days. And it took only nine days before that for the case count to increase by a similar amount. Also, the world population is about 7.8 billion, which means that more than one person per thousand has been infected with the virus worldwide.
Even though traffic has increased over the past few weeks its density is still fairly low and as a result the wildlife is more venturesome than before. Today while strolling through a residential area I saw a fox going through the back yards of some houses and then crossing the street as it passed in front of me. It was indeed rather closer to me than I liked; for a moment I wondered whether it was rabid. It was not, however; it had simply become so accustomed to crossing streets that it had previously shunned on account of cars that it no longer was as timid as before.
Some bad news for hikers, at any rate hikers of the Appalachian Trail: the Supreme Court has decided that the federal government has the right to build a pipeline across the trail. The Atlantic Coast Pipeline will actually go below the trail, but it will take several months of construction for completion and of course it will affect the appearance of the area, and not for the better. There is actually a second pipeline, the Mountain Valley Pipeline, whose construction was halted until a decision on the Atlantic Coast Pipeline was reached, and it too will cross the AT.
The FDA has revoked emergency authorization for anti-malarial drugs hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine. Our President has repeatedly touted them as effective treatment for the virus and he has as repeatedly been challenged on this point by medical experts. They have no demonstrable power to mitigate the effects of the virus, but they do have several undesirable side effects, such as heart arrhythmia and nerve damage.
The President has displayed similar acumen in another recent claim. “If we stop testing right now, we’d have very few cases, actually,” he said during a roundtable event for seniors. And our credulous public continues to rally around him in droves! I don’t believe most people would care to enter a taxicab whose driver believes that if he shuts his eyes while driving, he’d never see any red lights and thus never be forced to stop for traffic lights.
Beijing is bracing for a second wave of the virus. A new outbreak of 79 cases to date occurred in the vicinity of the Xinfadi wholesale market, which has been shut down. Tests are being performed to determine how far the cluster has spread and more lockdown measures may be instituted over the next few days.
The situation in Latin America continues to deteriorate. Brazil’s case count is nearly 900,000; it will increase to over a million by the end of the week. Mexico’s case count is over 150,000. Peru’s case count will soon overtake that of Italy, and Chile’s case count will soon overtake that of Turkey. If the trend continues, Mexico, Peru, and Chile will eventually overtake all European countries and will be exceeded only by Brazil, Russia, and India.
Today’s statistics as of 8:00 PM — # of cases worldwide: 8,108,581; # of deaths worldwide: 438,581; # of cases U.S.: 2,182,864; # of deaths U.S.: 118,280.