Source: CDC COVID data tracker, accessed 5/1/2023
This brief note to mark what I hope is a final footnote to the COVID-19 pandemic. The COVID-19 new case rate, as-reported, has finally fallen below its prior pandemic low.
As you probably (don’t) recall, we got a little respite from COVID-19 in the summer of 2021 (e.g. , Post #1163). For those of us who keep score, that was the brief period post-vaccine, pre- Delta and Omicron.
Ever since that — what with new variants and all that — that new cases rate has remained above that level.
Until now. As shown above, as of this week, reported new U.S. cases are as low as they were in the summer of 2021. And new case rates still appear to be falling.
Source: Our World in Data, accessed 5/1/2023
Around the world, all is quiet with the possible exception of Australia and New Zealand. It’s worth noting that they are in late fall there, equivalent of November 1 in the Northern Hemisphere, and that coronavirus cases of all sorts tend to peak in the winter.
The COVID-19 death rate is around 1,000 COVID-19 per week (not shown). That’s half of what it was back at the prior low in the summer of 2021. More to the point, on a per-week basis, risk of death from COVID-19 is now lower than risk of death from flu, in a typical flu season. Putting aside issues such as long COVID, we’ve reached the point where COVID-19 now poses no more than flu-like risks to the U.S. population, in terms of mortality risk. As you can see from the “deaths” column below, 1000/week would be mid-range for a typical 20 to 30-week flu season.
Source: Calculated from CDC illness burden of flu web page.
The practical upshot of all this, for me, is that I’ve long since stopped wearing a mask in all but higher-risk situations. I don’t wear one while shopping, for example, figuring that risk of infection is almost negligible in that situation. Low new-case rate, large space, few encounters, and brief encounters with other people.
But I still mask up in some situations. Yesterday my wife and I attended a community theater performance. I figure the auditorium held about 100 people. Based on my calculation below, there was about a 3 percent chance that somebody in that crowd was actively infectious with COVID-19. We were going to share that relatively small room with that crowd for a couple of hours. It was a comedy, so you’d expect people to be laughing, which is likely to result in increased emission of airborne droplets, similar to coughing or singing.
So we masked up. Why not. I now have what would I’m guessing is a more-than-lifetime supply of high-filtration masks.
It was a matinee performance, so there was a lot of gray hair in the audience. Best guess, I’d say that maybe one-in-fifteen in that crowd was masked.
Not with a bang but with a whimper. I think that’s the right quote for ending this.
