Do you think the reasoning for not updating that is as purposeful as I do?

Governor Cooper delays his announcement on school plans. School starts in like...7 weeks...nothing like cutting it close:

statefan91 said:

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Governor Cooper delays his announcement on school plans. School starts in like...7 weeks...nothing like cutting it close:

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"Dr. Mandy Cohen says current research is encouraging:"

This is the most hilarious thing that I think I have read in over a month... ***** talks out of the other side of her mouth for the first time in how long now?!? You can't be serious... and yet the sheep just lap it up without any questions...

Tootie4Pack said:

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Mormad said:

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Tobaccoroadsportscafe said:

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Mormad said:

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Everybody has to have an agenda. Had a local restaurant owner tell me they were likely not to make it because their dining area is small so can't have many patrons in house, but so many "people are angry that we opened the dining area" that their take out business declined greatly. What is wrong with people? I swear people just want to be angry about something. Does it make people feel better to constantly disagree and make silly irrational choices because of it???

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The situation is pretty bleak for locally owned restaurants. We're doing about 30% of normal business and I don't think it's going to get much better this year. Staff doesn't really want to come back to work yet either, and I can't really blame them.

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My dad owned Jerry's grill on east Whitaker mill in Raleigh for 40 yrs (all you that didn't give it a try really missed out, my mom made so much of it homemade it was ridiculous), and he barely survived the Carter presidency, but he'd have NEVER survived this crap. Really tough business, even when things are clicking. Good luck to you.

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Your Dad owned Jerry's Grill ? What a small world. Many years ago , as my Dad was getting ready to retire from the working for the State, he got into the pay phone business to keep him busy and make a little income. He had the pay phone at Jerry's for many years. I would help him and remember going there many times over those years. And you are right , as I recall the food was very, very good !!

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What's funny is I probably met you years ago in that place when I worked summers, and probably made you some food lol

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/01/official-us-coronavirus-death-toll-is-a-substantial-undercount-of-actual-tally-new-yale-study-finds.html

Would love to know this type of information for NC specifically. Interesting that excess deaths are up nationwide even after considering all deaths attributed to COVID.

"The 781,000 total deaths in the United States in the three months through May 30 were about 122,300, or nearly 19% higher, than what would normally be expected, according to the researchers. Of the 122,300 excess deaths, 95,235 were attributed to Covid-19, they said. Most of the rest of the excess deaths, researchers said, were likely related to or directly caused by the coronavirus."

acslater1344 said:

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https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/01/official-us-coronavirus-death-toll-is-a-substantial-undercount-of-actual-tally-new-yale-study-finds.html

Would love to know this type of information for NC specifically. Interesting that excess deaths are up nationwide even after considering all deaths attributed to COVID.

"The 781,000 total deaths in the United States in the three months through May 30 were about 122,300, or nearly 19% higher, than what would normally be expected, according to the researchers. Of the 122,300 excess deaths, 95,235 were attributed to Covid-19, they said. Most of the rest of the excess deaths, researchers said, were likely related to or directly caused by the coronavirus."

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NC is really behind on their CDC reporting and hasn't shown a non-weighted week yet with excess deaths. I expect to see some in May.

I really think what happened in the NYC Metro area is going to throw some of the numbers off nationwide. Their death toll is insane and there has to be some care related or non-COVID excess deaths due to delayed care.

RunsWithWolves26 said:

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Everpack said:

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No one has bothered to answer the question of how long we wear masks? What is our finish line?

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November. There's something big happening then and depending on the outcome of that, it will dictate if this virus is terrible or not so bad.

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I absolutely agree and it's sad.

You are probably right. Thanks for sharing about your parents owning and operating Jerry's. Back when Raleigh and Wake County was a lot smaller and the neighborhood restaurants were the hubs of the community.

wilmwolf80 said:

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Civilized said:

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wilmwolf80 said:

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Why does it matter if I agree with it if I'm complying?

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I wasn't being critical, I was just curious.

It's always interesting to hear how people would handle tough issues if they were the ones making decisions about policy.

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If you just want my unfiltered personal opinion. I don't disagree with it on merit necessarily, though I do have misgivings about it because I see that wearing masks causes people to have a false sense of security and disregard social distancing, but I do disagree with the implementation of it. I feel that like all of the directives, it lacks definition,and leaves too much to interpretation. If you are going to require masks indoors, just require masks indoors. I also feel that if you think there is a solid scientific basis for requiring masks, then why wasn't that implemented at the start of Phase 2? That science hasn't changed since we moved to Phase 2.

With pretty much all of the decisions that have been made, I feel that NC is just copying other states rather than using the data in our own state to make real, informed decisions. In my opinion, Cooper didn't want to go to Phase 3 for July 4th, because we went to Phase 2 at Memorial Day, and it wasn't good optics to have people gathering and partying on the holiday weekend. I believe the mask mandate, and the questionable reporting of numbers leading up to the decision to extend Phase 2, were used to justify a decision to try and help curtail social gatherings on what is the biggest social gathering day of the summer.

I remain skeptical that any of the measures that we have taken have had any meaningful impact on the spread of the virus, mainly because everything we have done has been woefully unsuccessful in stopping the transmission of the virus to the most vulnerable parts of our population. Rather than broad, sweeping orders that put so many of people out of work, I would have preferred detailed, aggressive measures to stop the spread to long term care facilities, processing plants, etc. Fully two thirds of the deaths in this state have occurred in congregate facilities, places that we knew at the start were vulnerable. How much different do our charts and graphs look if we devoted the resources necessary to lock down those facilities, test heavily in those areas, contract trace employees and patients alike when positive cases happen to stop whole facilities from having outbreaks? As I've written in this thread multiple times, I don't fault the decisions that were made in the early days of the virus, but once you have clear data as to where the problem spots are, focus your efforts there.

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Thanks for the detailed response, and yeah I hear you.

Part of the issue here is that governors are generalists. They are not epidemiologists, data scientists, medical doctors, or economists but are tasked with making hard decisions that involve complex inputs from all those fields. Same with any politician on any tough decision, really, but the scrutiny on them gets amplified in accordance with the importance/impact of the decision.

We can parse Cooper's words and potential motivations all day long but the mask mandate was better late than never. It's all upside. And we can quibble with the specifics of Cooper's response over the last three months but circumstantially he seems more data-driven and deliberate than many other major-state governors.

We were woefully unprepared for a targeted, Asia-like response to the virus. We've been on our heels and scrambling to catch up at both the state and federal levels. Hopefully the state and federal governments will be much better prepared for the next one, the same way that southeast Asia cut their teeth on SARS and were much better prepared than we were for COVID.

Cohen implied last night on UNC TV that we are going to see hospitalizations go up again in the next numbers.

It is past time that the DHHS provides a breakdown of hospitalizations both by criticality and by region.

Wayland said:

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Cohen implied last night on UNC TV that we are going to see hospitalizations go up again in the next numbers.

It is past time that the DHHS provides a breakdown of hospitalizations both by criticality and by region.

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Well, yesterday's raw numbers show 1843 Newly Reported Confirmed Cases / 32,205 Newly Reported Completed Tests = 5.72% second day in a row that we are WELL BELOW the running average of 7.059%.

Deaths as a Percentage of BOTH Completed Tests and Confirmed Cases DROPS AGAIN... those running averages are now at 0.145% (/Tests) and 2.064% (/Cases) respectively.

It is completely illogical that hospitalizations continue to rise without there having been a change in admittance policy... I mean, just tell us the truth... but again, the truth just doesn't fit the agenda right now.

CLI Surveillance comes out today, so we will get a little window into that.

But there are a lot of news reports elsewhere of covid positive non covid patients counting in the census and NC says they do the same. Which again goes into why that number needs to be broken down further.

Even with the increase, Cohen does say there is no immediate cause for alarm.

Wayland said:

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CLI Surveillance comes out today, so we will get a little window into that.

But there are a lot of news reports elsewhere of covid positive non covid patients counting in the census and NC says they do the same. Which again goes into why that number needs to be broken down further.

Even with the increase, Cohen does say there is no immediate cause for alarm.

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What did you think of 32,205 Newly Reported Tests for a single day?

TheStorm said:

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Wayland said:

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CLI Surveillance comes out today, so we will get a little window into that.

But there are a lot of news reports elsewhere of covid positive non covid patients counting in the census and NC says they do the same. Which again goes into why that number needs to be broken down further.

Even with the increase, Cohen does say there is no immediate cause for alarm.

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What did you think of 32,205 Newly Reported Tests for a single day?

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Data management at DHHS is a mess, but that is the second time in two weeks they have done weird things with data on a Cooper talking day.

Wayland said:

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TheStorm said:

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Wayland said:

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CLI Surveillance comes out today, so we will get a little window into that.

But there are a lot of news reports elsewhere of covid positive non covid patients counting in the census and NC says they do the same. Which again goes into why that number needs to be broken down further.

Even with the increase, Cohen does say there is no immediate cause for alarm.

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What did you think of 32,205 Newly Reported Tests for a single day?

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Data management at DHHS is a mess, but that is the second time in two weeks they have done weird things with data on a Cooper talking day.

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Ding ding ding. I'm sure they've talked about and thought through ways to be more detailed in the reporting of data and adding more context to large swings via footnotes, but at the end of the day I don't believe they have the confidence in themselves to get it right. They know everything they put out is going to be scrutinized in a major way, and they're scared to face the increased pressure and questioning around providing more meaningful data.

That said, the lack of detailed reporting around hospitalizations is a joke. I'm not sure if it's just DHHS's own incompetence standing in the way or data limitations related to how hospitals provide information upstream, but they need to be asked why they are failing at providing what is probably the most important set of figures related to COVID at the state level.

Wayland said:

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Quote:

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6/30/2020 Morning DHHS update (as of 12:00pm)

NC Cases
63,484
NC Deaths
1343
Currently Hospitalized
908 <- 90% reporting (was 843 at 75% yesterday) Higher#, Higher%. Still stable
Completed Tests
910,033

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804 Deaths are now Congregate (+8)
146 Deaths are now Unknown Setting (+1)
+18 Deaths Overall since yesterday.

393 Deaths assumed General Population (+9)
950 Congregate and Unknown Setting. (+9)

216 Congregate Facilities now have an outbreak. (+6)
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WRAL is at 1366* deaths

1186 positive cases over 23,728 new tests. 5.0% positive rate.

DHHS says they only added 18,676 completed tests, but the actual delta is 23,728 since yesterday.

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7/1/2020 Morning DHHS update (as of 12:00pm)

NC Cases
66,513
NC Deaths
1373
Currently Hospitalized
901 <- 86% reporting (was 908 at 90% yesterday) Lower#, Lower%. Still stable
Completed Tests
942,238

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819 Deaths are now Congregate (+15)
147 Deaths are now Unknown Setting (+1)
+30 Deaths Overall since yesterday.

407 Deaths assumed General Population (+14)
966 Congregate and Unknown Setting. (+16)

212 Congregate Facilities now have an outbreak. (-4)
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WRAL is at 1376* deaths

1843 positive cases over 32,205 new tests. 5.7% positive rate.

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7/2/2020 Morning DHHS update (as of 12:00pm)

NC Cases
68,142
NC Deaths
1391
Currently Hospitalized
912 <- 93% reporting (was 901 at 86% yesterday) Higher#, Higher%. Still stable
Completed Tests
942,238

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826 Deaths are now Congregate (+7)
149 Deaths are now Unknown Setting (+2)
+18 Deaths Overall since yesterday.

416 Deaths assumed General Population (+9)
975 Congregate and Unknown Setting. (+9)

220 Congregate Facilities now have an outbreak. (+8)
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WRAL is at 1400* deaths

1629 positive cases over 28,882 new tests. 5.6% positive rate.

After what Cohen said last night I was worried about hospitalizations, but still pretty stable. One of the highest reporting percent EVER and still staying stable!

Date of Death for today's adds: 6/30(10), 6/28, 6/26, 6/19, 6/15, 6/13, 6/5(2) and one missing.

Hopefully all these outbreaks are just catching staff and before they get bad.

Nothing out of the ordinary in the location data. Just happened to be a day where all the major players had deaths reported the same day (Meck, Wake, Durham, Guilford, Forsyth). Have to make sure to get it in before the weekend.

The Triad does seem to be ahead of Wake/Meck for whatever reason. Maybe an early hit?

I am a little baffled that the hospital numbers are so locked in right now. I would have expected more case 'fluffing' of the numbers. Not even blaming hospitals at this point, but just saying that so many cases are being detected and the metrics are so generally defined that the hospitals have to count covid positive non covid patients. I am keeping my fingers crossed.

Acslater, how are you and your girlfriend doing?

As always, appreciate your insight. Do you have any way of knowing the history of the people that are hospitalized but not in ICU? Specifically, are any of them patients that were previously in ICU and have been transitioned to regular care? With so few people in ICU or on a respirator, I'm just trying to figure out why the others are in the hospital. If they are transitioning from ICU to regular care and eventually to discharge, that makes a little more sense to me. You probably don't have any way of knowing, but I'm also curious in general how many people that are admitted initially for observation end up in ICU.

Maybe so because people aren't playing nicely here IMHO. We have a much higher LTC population than both per capita, and we had the Montagnard and Hispanic hits I think. Deaths are high but 50 percent died outside the facility, which suggests a hit to the sick/ dying/ low QOL, DNR population. Glad we're stable, but the Triad won't push policy IMHO. Gonna be meck and wake.

I think those are really really important numbers/ trends to know. Obviously, those who were in ICU eventually either die or transition to the floor. Many ventilated patients died earlier on, as many as 75 percent. But I'll have to play with the numbers to answer your question, because there haven't been enough in ICU here to explain an average floor census of 40. I need to ask some docs what their threshold for admission is now. As I've said before, we all want to avoid these patients because of risks to ourselves, our staff, and our families. Found out today about a doc close to me who tested positive, along with his wife. While I understand how this nightmare has affected so many so profoundly (I personally took a 75 percent pay cut so I'm there with you guys), it irks me a little to read statements like the November outcomes will determine whether this is really bad or not so bad. At least I'd never say that to the family of the 24 yo nurse tubed in the unit.

Are they really trying to avoid the vent at this point, so it is used less in critical care? Or is it the number of critical patients have actually gone down?

Prayers are with the poor nurse (and for that matter anyone who is suffering through this).

Mormad said:

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Maybe so because people aren't playing nicely here IMHO. We have a much higher LTC population than both per capita, and we had the Montagnard and Hispanic hits I think. Deaths are high but 50 percent died outside the facility, which suggests a hit to the sick/ dying/ low QOL, DNR population. Glad we're stable, but the Triad won't push policy IMHO. Gonna be meck and wake.

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I still think an undertold storyline in all the metrics is the impact on the Hispanic / Latino population. Seems like many of the geographies we are now hearing about huge numbers happen to also large Latino populations.

That doesn't make the news any better....but perhaps more targeted in what groups need to be particularly diligent, etc.

Meck posted their Friday report a day early because of the holiday. Looks like hospitalizations have been stable the last week, and cases had plateaued (or were trending down a little) until a massive dump two days ago.




Based on looking at their last report, they do not seem to update the case report with 'backlog' data. Any new data added, is added to the new days added.

Testing numbers have to be jumping fast right now. Last week I had employees getting results back in 3 days. This week, they've told a couple people it could be 8 days. Are labs getting backed up that bad right now?

I think so. The state has mentioned that they are getting lag in their data as well from labs being overrun. I think you can see some of that in the date of specimen collected graphs.

BruceDouble said:

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Testing numbers have to be jumping fast right now. Last week I had employees getting results back in 3 days. This week, they've told a couple people it could be 8 days. Are labs getting backed up that bad right now?

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Vacation season baby!

Hospitalization trend is still going down. ICU down last week as well. Even with cases going up. This is more good news on this trend!!! Not the BS % of ED visits graph they show.


or show this:


Instead they choose this:

Tobaccoroadsportscafe said:

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Mormad said:

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Everybody has to have an agenda. Had a local restaurant owner tell me they were likely not to make it because their dining area is small so can't have many patrons in house, but so many "people are angry that we opened the dining area" that their take out business declined greatly. What is wrong with people? I swear people just want to be angry about something. Does it make people feel better to constantly disagree and make silly irrational choices because of it???

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The situation is pretty bleak for locally owned restaurants. We're doing about 30% of normal business and I don't think it's going to get much better this year. Staff doesn't really want to come back to work yet either, and I can't really blame them.

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I'm in sales with a company that provides services to the hospitality industry. It's not looking good for a lot of people I work with.

Hell, it's hard on restaurants when things are going well.

Best wishes, TR. You're one of our customers btw.

We're up to 56 in house, 9 in ICU, 4 tubed. We're reporting between 111 and 115 dead, with 53 dying in the hospital.

Interesting in the first graph above that non-Covid admissions are spiking and having some impact on overall Covid %s.

Mormad said:

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We're up to 56 in house, 9 in ICU, 4 tubed. We're reporting between 111 and 115 dead, with 53 dying in the hospital.

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Not ideal