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Interim Management, Skilled Monitoring, and Reinvention
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Greetings!
In this issue, to accommodate our current focus on understanding the post-Covid existence or, perhaps, revitalization, we continue to offer Covid data and daily pandemic reporting in our now standard short form. We also continue with our efforts at curating and posting the best podcasts and stories on the long-term effects of the pandemic.
- New coronavirus cases have declined more than 80 percent from their peak in mid-January. Still, daily case reports remain well above 100,000 per day.
- About 85,000 people with the virus are hospitalized nationwide. This number, as well as the number of Covid-19 patients in intensive care units, has fallen by more than 30 percent in the last two weeks.
- After several weeks of rapid growth, death reports have also begun a modest downturn. Around 2,300 deaths are reported each day, a decrease of more than 10 percent since the start of the month.
- Cases are currently declining in every U.S. state. In all but four states, reports of new infections are down by 50 percent or more in the last two weeks.
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West Virginia, Alabama and Kentucky have the country’s highest numbers of recent hospitalizations. Those states have vaccination rates well below the national average.
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Before turning to world data, we link you to the Washington Post’s "U.S. ‘Excess deaths’ during pandemic surpassed 1 million, with Covid killing most but other diseases adding to the toll, CDC says" and the complementary and equal must-read The New York Times’ article, "U.S. has far higher Covid death rate than other wealthy countries."
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The world surpassed 400 million known coronavirus cases, just one month after reaching 300 million, a staggering increase driven by the highly transmissible Omicron variant. That new figure is likely a vast undercount, since many at-home tests do not make the official tally. And because an Omicron infection is less likely to lead to hospitalization or death, case counts require a fresh perspective.
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Britain announced plans to lift its remaining coronavirus restrictions one month earlier than scheduled, and several German states also eased measures, as health systems in Western Europe appeared able to manage the Omicron surge.
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Cases rose sharply in South Korea, Indonesia, Singapore and other Asian countries following the Lunar New Year, a holiday period usually marked by large family gatherings.
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After recording just one case during the pandemic, the South Pacific nation of Tonga is now grappling with a widening outbreak following the start of aid deliveries to help the island recover from a volcanic eruption in January.
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More than 10.2 billion vaccine doses have been administered worldwide, including over 1.1 billion boosters or additional doses. Track each country’s vaccination progress here.
To close our World Data Section we offer Atlantic reprter Uri Friedman’s most interesting story on South Korea, which “has repeatedly suppressed the spread of the virus and kept deaths to relatively low levels;” the complete story is linked at "The seven habits of Covid-resilient nations."
Today’s post-data-lead-story is from The Atlantic’s reporter Yasmin Tayag, who attempts to calm us down in the brief and brilliant "Downright maddening: How to live with the uncertainty of not knowing what comes next." We encourage you to read this great article, where Tayag quotes Karin Coifman, an associate professor of psychology at Kent State University (Rebecca’s alma mater) who told her: “Part of what makes post-Omicron life so stressful is that knowing what precautions to take is so hard. Especially if you’re fully vaccinated, you don’t have to feel guilty or ashamed about relaxing some of your personal rules. ‘It may be that this week you’re feeling that you’re not ready to go out into the world so much yet .... 'Allow yourself the flexibility, and a little bit of compassion. Allow yourself to reevaluate, to change your mind, and to try things out.’”
We turn to Vox for what many readers find to be the key question of the day: “Why young children have waited so long for Covid-19 vaccines.”
Transitioning from kids to seniors, we think you need to read The Atlantic’s Sarah Zhang’s "The Covid strategy America hasn’t really tried," which finds “the clearest way to reduce deaths is to push to vaccinate more of the elderly—yes, still!” Digging deeper into our failures at keeping seniors healthy, we turn to Kaiser Health News’ reporting: "At nursing homes, long waits for results render Covid tests ‘Useless.’" The trio of senior health and living articles concludes with our go-to publication Skilled Nursing News’ article by great reporter Alex Zorn (with quotes from our occasional colleague the experts’ expert Brian Cloch). "Skilled nursing operators are trying to adjust to how the Covid-19 pandemic changed the care continuum, with patients now embarking on different pathways after hospital stays," is a must-read article for those interested in the future of long term care; here, Zorn reports, “Not only are more patients going directly to home health, but long-term acute care hospitals (LTACHs) and inpatient rehabilitation facilities (IRFs) also have started to play more prominent roles.”
Reopening America, appears in a first-time link to listen, where they examine “One of the longest running mysteries of the pandemic has been long Covid and what causes it.” Yasmin Tayag, whose great article in The Atlantic is found above, offers great reporting on “what could be behind long Covid.”
In and out of the classroom and living in one of the few counties which demand masks at indoor cafes and gyms, this is Revitalize for Feb. 17, 2022:
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Revitalize: The week in health-care news you need
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U.S. ‘excess deaths’ during pandemic surpassed 1 million, with Covid killing most but other diseases adding to the toll, CDC says.
U.S. has far higher Covid death rate than other wealthy countries.
Two years into the pandemic, the coronavirus is killing Americans at far higher rates than people in other wealthy nations, a sobering distinction to bear as the country charts a course through the next stages of the pandemic.
The seven habits of Covid-resilient nations. South Korea has repeatedly suppressed the spread of the virus and kept deaths to relatively low levels.
Post-Omicron life can be downright maddening. How to live with the uncertainty of not knowing what comes next. Tayag quotes Karin Coifman, an associate professor of psychology at Kent State University (Rebecca’s alma mater) who told her: “Part of what makes post-Omicron life so stressful is that knowing what precautions to take is so hard. Especially if you’re fully vaccinated, you don’t have to feel guilty or ashamed about relaxing some of your personal rules. ‘It may be that this week you’re feeling that you’re not ready to go out into the world so much yet ... Allow yourself the flexibility, and a little bit of compassion. Allow yourself to reevaluate, to change your mind, and to try things out.’”
Why young children have waited so long for Covid-19 vaccines. Covid-19 vaccines for young children are coming. But it’s complicated.
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The Covid strategy America hasn’t really tried. The clearest way to reduce deaths is to push to vaccinate more of the elderly—yes, still!
At nursing homes, long waits for results render Covid tests ‘Useless.’
Skilled nursing operators are trying to adjust to how the Covid-19 pandemic changed the care continuum, with patients now embarking on different pathways after hospital stays. Not only are more patients going directly to home health, but long-term acute care hospitals (LTACHs) and inpatient rehabilitation facilities (IRFs) also have started to play more prominent roles.”
Scientists narrow down what could be causing long Covid. One of the longest running mysteries of the pandemic has been long Covid and what causes it. Studies have found that 10-20 percent of people that have recovered from the coronavirus get long Covid which can appear up to 3 months after recovery and last for 6 months or more in some cases. Researchers are zeroing in on the causes and the two leading theories are that the virus turns the immune system against the body and despite recovering, the virus could be lingering in the body not in the blood, but in the body's tissues.
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Jerry Seelig, CEO
Fax: 310-841-2842
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