40 million cases and counting

Wild Nephin walk

 COVID-19 CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC

Last updated: October 18, 2020, 09:31 GMT

Graphs - Countries - Death Rate - Symptoms - Incubation - Transmission - News

Coronavirus Cases:

40,006,239

view by country

Deaths:

1,115,202

Recovered:

29,922,911

Not to be depressive, but the world has documented 40M cases, a drop in the bucket compared to the total population figures. They are talking about level 5 lockdown, which would be awful for the winter. It's actually pretty stupid because being winter, if we are permitted to drive some distance, we could just go off and walk in the woods. See nature and recharge as we did this week in Wild Nephin, a rewilding project nearby where 11k hectares of land are being left as wilderness and national park. I hope it works and nature takes its course. 

Otherwise, we'd be stuck indoors with people coughing in our faces. Alex and I got our flu shots and I had my teeth cleaned. Still need to get a GP visit in before the winter outbreak becomes too bad in these parts. 

Still can't write and people are getting rabid. Facebook is exploding with rancour. I will wait until after the election. If Biden wins, I start writing. If Trump wins, I crawl into a hole and lock out the world. 

Coronavirus news of the day

The world has surpassed 35M confirmed cases of SARS-CoV-2 infection, Donald Trump is hospitalised with it at Walter Reed, Melania Trump has it in the White House, and lots of others have been tested positive, including Kellyanne Conway, Chris Christie, several Senators and Trump's campaign manager. The incidence of new infections is on the rise around the world, and we've reached the daily figures of early April here in Ireland. Lockdown is on the way. It's going to get a lot worse. 

Interestingly, Trump is being treated with exactly the drugs I would choose:  Regeneron's polyclonal antibodies and a 5-day course of remdesivir (Gilead). 

Thank goodness that Biden and his wife tested negative as did Pence. At least maybe the election can proceed. We've cast our ballots and Alex has already received his confirmation. 

At least Alex and I got our flu shots and Meike had her cataract operation. I should get a physical exam and dental cleaning before it gets worse. And it's going to get a lot worse. 

1M+ dead so far

 COVID-19 CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC

Last updated: September 29, 2020, 12:02 GMT

Graphs - Countries - Death Rate - Symptoms - Incubation - Transmission - News

Coronavirus Cases:

33,590,320

view by country

Deaths:

1,007,227

Recovered:

24,904,364

More than 33M confirmed infections and more than 1M excess deaths marks a dark milestone on this pandemic journey. Moreover, people are starting to talk openly about what's being called 'long Covid' by the 'long-haulers'.  The symptoms range from chronic conditions that suggest it precipitates metabolic syndrome -- diabetes, hypertension, arrhythmias, to neurologic complications including brain fog and strokes, to nonspecific symptoms like hoarseness, loss of voice, hair loss and exhaustion. 

Heard a story on the radio here this morning about a young healthcare worker in his 30s who was very fit and healthy when he contracted Covid-19 and landed in ICU. They put him in a coma for a few days, and he woke up two months later, with chronic conditions including diabetes, hypertension, arrhythmias, and asthma. Had none before.

An article in the NY Times today indicates the worst problem is that no one, including the docs, are listening to the long-haulers, thinking instead that the ongoing symptoms are psychological. I've been hearing that quite a lot. 

An excellent BBC podcast explores all the weird symptoms and what is known about the mechanisms by which the SARS-CoV2 virus operates.  Basically, not very much. Yet I am convinced that this virus is going to teach us an awful lot about how chronic disease occurs. I've long thought that it's a combination of genetic susceptibility triggered by microbial infection. Diabetes, hypertension, arrhythmias, dementias, cancers -- I think one day we will know the causes and they will be minuscule. 

Not unlike in the War of the Worlds, it will be the smallest inhabitants that bring us down. How's that for apocalyptic thinking?

A drop in the bucket

More than 30M confirmed cases of coronavirus infection, and almost 1M dead worldwide, 200,000 dead surpassed in the US alone. But this is just a drop in the bucket when considering the total population of the world, 7.8B people. We have a long way to go. 

Sir David Attenborough's new documentary, Extinction: the facts, is profound in its directness. Humans are at the root of extinction of the earth's biodiversity. And it's our sheer numbers at fault. I know that. I have known that since I was a young girl reading science fiction. In the year I was born, there were 2.7B people on this earth. There was space between them. Now with 7.8B and growing, it's closing in on us. The earth can no longer sustain us. It's a small wonder all the rich people are looking for a way off this planet. They know we won't change before it collapses. 

Just passed 25M confirmed Covid-19 cases

We've just passed 25M confirmed cases of coronavirus infection. That's less than 1% of the world population (7.8B). We have a long way to go. It's only just sinking in to people that this is far from over. The US deaths per 1K population has reached 562, same as Brazil. Shocking. 

The US spends more on healthcare but has the lowest life expectancy of any OECD country. It has the highest suicide rate among the nations surveyed. How can this be? It's all so broken. 

I have been unable to write and I'm not the only one. People all over are reporting inability to concentrate. We all struggle to deal with the pandemic yet we morosely follow the numbers. It's like the old days with the Vietnam war and the tallies of deaths on both sides and horrific images of children being maimed and massacred. 

Elections are around the corner. I hope people have been shocked out of complacency and will do the right thing. VOTE!

COVID-19 CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC

Last updated: August 29, 2020, 15:57 GMT

Graphs - Countries - Death Rate - Symptoms - Incubation - Transmission - News

Coronavirus Cases:

25,013,265

view by country

Deaths:

843,096

Recovered:

17,380,667

The clock keeps ticking

It's mid-August and the pandemic is just beginning to resurge. People just can't stay away from each other, and so they slip into their old behaviours. It's a very 'me' centric world. 'It's not going to affect me. I'm young and healthy,' and they congregate in bars, on beaches and on the streets. There are 7.8 billion people in the world right now. Even if there are 10 times more infections than documented, that's less than 3% of the population. We have a long way to go. 

COVID-19 CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC

Last updated: August 16, 2020, 13:53 GMT

Graphs - Countries - Death Rate - Symptoms - Incubation - Transmission - News

Coronavirus Cases:

21,674,447

view by country

Deaths:

769,957

Recovered:

14,385,381

Atomic Bombs and Pandemics

This week is the 75th Anniversary of the dropping of an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, where 100,000 people died. Between Hiroshima and Nagasaki, it is estimated that 129,000–226,000 were killed. Maybe because it was men who dropped bombs that killed instantly, the atrocity committed by Americans for 'just cause' seems so catastrophically evil.  

Less than a month ago, I reported 12M cases of confirmed Covid-19. Now it's up to 18M and almost 700,000 dead. Yet, the fact that this virus, which behaves so unlike anything previously known to man not unlike the atom bomb of the microbial world, has killed so many over the course of six months is hard to get my head around. It has made it almost impossible for me to write anything but factual pieces and blogs. Everything else seems so pointless. 

Coronavirus Cases:

18,069,950

view by country

Deaths:

689,755

Recovered:

11,363,390