If there’s anything you should take away from my last few posts, it’s that this problem isn’t going to solve itself. Someone needs to step up.
Friday a week ago, the US CDC said, mask up in public. Huge change in public guidance. Read Post #602. I’m not making this up. I’m not hallucinating it. May not sound like it, but it was a huge change from the CDC.
It was an admission that this disease was likely being transmitted in ways that they had not anticipated. It was an admission that sick people, coughing and sneezing in public, was NOT the primary mode of transmission for COVID-19. Because if that were true, just keeping your distance would have been enough.
And people around here took that call to mask-up to heart, near as I can tell. There was a sea-change between the last time I grocery shopped and the time before that.
As you know, if you read this blog, I’ve been hawking the use of masks in public for a while. And you’re smart enough to know that the “pipeline” of cases is maybe 10 to 12 days long. It takes that long for any change in the infection rate to filter out into the statistics. That’s 5-6 days from the point of infection to the point that you have symptoms, and then, however long it takes to get you tested, and get those test results entered into the system.
The first time interval is determined by biology. But the second, we might plausibly hope, can be affected by humans. As in, can be shortened as this progresses.
So I thought I’d bring the most recent data to your attention. Today’s data. Just about exactly 10 days after the CDC said, mask up.
I’m just gonna present the info. Draw your own conclusions about whether today’s case count increase was different, or not.
Me? I’m lighting a candle tonight and offering a prayer. Because if this is just a statistical blip, we are in deep doo-doo. Again, see just prior post.
M—-UP is the day the CDC asked us all to mask up in public. The arrow points out the 10th day after. If this is mere wishful thinking, I’m happy to have one night where I think, even mistakenly, that I see a light at the end of the tunnel.
I’m not set up to look at the US as a whole. But I’ll settle for this, for now.
More on masks tomorrow.
