Tracking the Covid Surge

In just 4 days, the U.S. has gone from having a total of 21 states in the critical Red/Orange zone (10 or more daily infections per 100,000 residents), to 29 states in the critical Red/Orange zone, as of 7/18/20. This is a 16% increase. Of the states in the Orange zone, California and Arkansas are both poised to enter the Red soon, with over 20 infections per 100,000 each.

California has not changed significantly over the past week: they had 12 counties in the Red as of 7/10. They now (as of 7/18/20) have 13 counties in the Red and 25 counties in the Orange.

Contrary to common misperception, things are not so rosy in the rest of the world. As you can see from this map, most of South America is in the dangerous Orange zone, and several countries are in the Critical red, including Panama and French Guyana. Many people also erroneously believe that Israel has somehow dodged the worst of it, but their infection rate (18.5 new daily infections per 100,000 residents) is nearly identical to that of the U.S. (20.2), and higher than Brazil's 16.5 daily infections per 100,000 residents. Netanyahu is so reviled for his pathetic covid response that thousands of Israelis are braving water cannons and tear gas to protest him. Like Trump, Netanyahu has placed the interests of the oligarchs above the health and safety of the rest of Israel. And like Trump, he has blamed the protests on bizarre conspiracies (in this case, the deceased pedophile Jeffrey Epstein). Interestingly, the West Bank and Gaza, together, have an infection rate of 8.1, less than half that of Israel. This may be due, in part, to the fact that the West Bank and Gaza have no Ultra-Orthodox Jews, whose infection rate is four times that of the rest of Israel.

Europe is not escaping the latest surge either, despite having significantly reduced their infection rates since May.  Luxemburg had an infection rate of nearly 13 new daily infections per 100,000 residents (as of 7/18/20), well within the dangerous Orange zone. Montenegro was also in the orange. The UK is still chalking up more than 500 new infections per day. Turkey had over 900 new infections yeasterday. And Sweden, Portugal, Romania and Bulgaria are now seeing new surges, each with more than 4 new daily infections per 100,000 residents over the past 2 weeks, while much of the Balkans is now well over 7 daily infections and approaching the dangerous Orange zone.