Monday Covid-19 Data

The data from Monday provided yet more evidence that the outbreak is flattening in several states. However, in some, the outbreak continues to pick up steam. Does this runs contrary to the idea that as a country is flattening? Not necessarily, but it is important to remember that a country that spans a continent and holds 330 million people will experience the pandemic differently at different times. So some states like Washington will be first, and others will be last.

Our five states cover the range of worsening to stabilising. We hope that those stabilising states soon enter the improving phase. Though to beat the dead horse, I would add that just because a state is improving doesn’t mean we can all go back to life like we knew it two months ago. That would likely result in us being right back here shortly thereafter.

The situation in Pennsylvania
The situation in Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania continues to be a state where the pandemic is spreading within the denser metropolitan areas of Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, leaving the central T to see fewer cases that spread more slowly.

The situation in Delaware
The situation in Delaware

Delaware might be approaching an inflection point, given that its most populous county, New Castle, is about to reach 1000 cases. (By the end of today it likely will if its new case trend holds.) We know that deaths lag new cases, and so the worry is that the number of deaths will begin to increase rapidly. The hope is that the slow initial growth of the outbreak will have left hospitals able to better cope over the longer time frame than if everyone had gotten sick all at once.

The situation in Virginia
The situation in Virginia

Virginia is a state that we will contrast to New Jersey, which I will write about last. Because Virginia is a state where it appears the outbreak is beginning to pick up steam and accelerate, rather than flatten. There was the significant drop in cases on Sunday, but that was due to the state’s enhancement of reporting data. (Their website now includes many new statistics.) But just like that the Monday data showed over 450 new cases on Monday. The question will be whether or not over the remainder of the week those new case numbers fall from over 450 to less than 400 to show that the state can flatten the curve before the outbreak becomes especially severe.

The situation in Illinois
The situation in Illinois

Illinois has shown a lot of variability in its day-to-day numbers, hence the advantage of the rolling average. But even that has appeared a wee bit jagged. It’s tough to see the curve flattening just yet, but if we receive updates today and over the next few days that cases are consistently lower, than we might just be able to say the curve is flattening.

The situation in New Jersey
The situation in New Jersey

And of course in New Jersey we have a state where the curve really and truly has flattened. We have yet to see sustained evidence of a decline in the number of new daily cases. As I said before, this might be more a situation where the outbreak has stabilised and roughly the same number of new cases is being reported daily. Of course the hope is that whatever that rate is falls below the excess capacity threshold of the state’s hospitals.

But I also want to take a look at the state of New Jersey with a degree of granularity. Because, as I noted with Virginia above, not all states are at the same point in their outbreak. And the same can hold true within states. We know that the outbreak in New Jersey began in the north and was very late in reaching some parts of South Jersey. So the same metrics we run for the state, we can run for the counties—though the data I have been collecting from the states only goes back as far as St. Patrick’s Day.

New Jersey's curves
New Jersey’s curves

The northern counties, where the state has been hardest hit, have clearly begun to see the curve bend. But in the south the story is a bit more mixed. Some, like Burlington and Ocean, have seen the curve noticeably flatten. But in Camden and Mercer Counties, home to Camden and Trenton, respectively, the evidence is not quite there. Instead, in these populous counties there exists the very real possibility that the outbreak will continue accelerating for hopefully a very short while.

Credit for the pieces is mine.

Sunday Covid-19 Data

Another day, more cases of coronavirus and Covid-19. So let’s take a look at Sunday’s data as there were some interesting things going on.

First, let’s dispense with Virginia. The state is enhancing its reporting structure, and so they admit the data is likely an underestimate of the present situation in Virginia. So here’s Virginia, nothing really changed.

The situation in Virginia
The situation in Virginia

Moving on, we have Pennsylvania. Here we are beginning to truly see the disparity between the cities in the southeast and southwest, namely Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, and the T that describes what sometimes is used to describe Pennsyltucky. (Though it also includes cities like Harrisburg, the state capital.) The point is that the T of Pennsylvania has yet to suffer greatly from the outbreak. Of course, it’s also the part of the state least equipped to deal with a pandemic.

The situation in Pennsylvania
The situation in Pennsylvania

New Jersey is just bad. One can make the argument that South Jersey is hanging on. (Though I will touch on that later with an idea for today’s afterwork work.) Bergen County in the northeast is likely to surpass 10,000 cases on its own today. And that will put it above most states.

The situation in New Jersey
The situation in New Jersey

Delaware is tough because it sits as a small state next to several much larger ones. But, the numbers seem to indicate the outbreak is still worsening. Though in terms of geographic spread, there’s little to say other than that New Castle County, home to Wilmington, in the north is the heart of the state’s outbreak.

The situation in Delaware
The situation in Delaware

Illinois is a fascinating state, because of how dissimilar it is compared to Pennsylvania, a state which has a similar number of people.

The situation in Illinois
The situation in Illinois

The map shows that geographic spread still has a little way to go before reaching every county in the state. But the outbreak has been there longer than in Pennsylvania. And most of the darker purples are concentrated in the northeast, in Chicago and its collar counties. Compare that to Pennsylvania above where you will see dark purple scattered across the cities of its eastern third, e.g. Allentown and Scranton, and in the western parts near Pittsburgh. This too could be worth exploring in depth in the future.

Lastly I want to get to the cases curves charts. Here we look at the daily new cases in each state.

The curves, flattening or otherwise, of the five states.
The curves, flattening or otherwise, of the five states.

And unfortunately Sunday’s numbers will impact the Virginia curve, but it overall looks as if the state is worsening. I would argue that Illinois, which appears to be bending towards a steadying condition is likely in a weird weekly pattern where it appears to stabilise on weekends and then resumes reported infections come Monday. Pennsylvania might well be flattening its curve. I would want to see a few more days’ worth of data before stating that more definitively. Let’s give it to Wednesday or Thursday.

And then in New Jersey we have a fascinating trend. The curve of increasing number of cases has clearly broken. But it also is not shrinking. Instead, it seems to be more of a plateau. And in that case, the outbreak in New Jersey is not getting worse, but it’s also not getting any better. At least not numerically. However, the goal of flattening the curve is to create a slower, more steady increase in case numbers to help hospitals cope with surge volumes. So good news?

Credit for the pieces is mine.

Wednesday’s Corona Update

As I said yesterday, since people are finding these updates helpful on the social media, I am going to repost the previous evening’s graphics I make on the Coronavirus Covid-19 outbreak here on Coffeespoons as well. So while today is Thursday, these are the numbers states provided yesterday, so it’s more of a Wednesday update.

But here I can start with the flatter curves graphic. The New Jersey numbers in particular look good—I mean they’re still bad. Of course we are just a few big breaches of quarantine and lapses in social distancing from reversing that progress.

Maybe some curve flattening?
Maybe some curve flattening?

State-wise, Pennsylvania continues to worsen. However, a close look at the slope of the line in the previous chart indicates that the steepness of the growth may be lessening. Deaths passed 300 and cases are now firmly entrenched on both sides of the state with the rural, less densely populated areas in the Ridge and Valley portion of the state seemingly hit not as hard.

The situation in Pennsylvania
The situation in Pennsylvania

Despite the potential flattening, New Jersey is just in a rough spot. The final bastions of low case numbers in South Jersey are slowly filling up as Cape May County passed the 100-case threshold.

The situation in New Jersey
The situation in New Jersey

Delaware continues to accelerate and is now past 1000 cases.

The situation in Delaware
The situation in Delaware

Virginia continues to see cases spreading in the eastern, more populous portions of the state. And at 75 deaths, it’s nearing the 100-death threshold.

The situation in Virginia
The situation in Virginia

Illinois is seeing deaths occur away from Chicago, in the St. Louis suburban counties and in and around Springfield and Champaign and Bloomington areas.

The situation in Illinois
The situation in Illinois

Credit for the piece goes to me.

Tuesday’s Data on Covid-19

Here are the Tuesday figures for Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, Virginia, and Illinois. At the end is an updated version of the flattening curves chart as well. Given the value of these graphics that people have been texting, emailing, and DMing me on social media, I might consider making these a regular staple here on my blog as well. I would probably slowly write about other graphics covering the outbreak as well.

Any feedback is welcome on how to make the graphics more useful to you, the public.

Pennsylvania has finally reached the point where the virus has infected at least one person in every county. Now, if we shift our attention a wee bit to the deaths, we can see those are still largely confined to the eastern third of the state.

The condition in Pennsylvania
The condition in Pennsylvania

New Jersey continues to suffer greatly. But a sharp increase in new cases could be a blip, or it could mean the curve isn’t flattening. We need more data to see a longer trend. Regardless, over 3000 more people were reported infected and over 200 more died.

The condition in New Jersey
The condition in New Jersey

Delaware worsened significantly. As a small state, it has a lower captive population. But it is rapidly approaching 1000 cases. In fact, I would not be surprised if that is the headline from Wednesday.

The condition in Delaware
The condition in Delaware

Virginia also saw a significant uptick in cases. And most counties and independent cities in eastern Virginia now report cases. But the rural, mountainous counties in the west and southwest are not uniformly infected. At least not yet.

The condition in Virginia
The condition in Virginia

Illinois saw some geographic spread, but again, compared to a state like Pennsylvania, the worst in Illinois is disproportionately concentrated in the Chicago metropolitan area.

The condition in Illinois
The condition in Illinois

Lastly, the curves are not flattening in all the states but maybe New Jersey. But as I noted above, the higher daily cases there might be a blip.

The state of curves
The state of curves

Credit for the pieces goes to me.

Flattening the Corona Curves

Yesterday I mentioned that there was some data to suggest that at least in New Jersey the curve was flattening. Monday we received additional data and so I wanted to share what that data showed.

I used a set of bar charts to show the new daily cases yesterday for Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, Virginia, and Illinois. But as I mentioned, a single day can be a blip. Noise. We want to find the pattern or the signal within that data set. Consequently I applied a simple 7-day rolling average to the new daily cases data set.

I chose seven days for two reasons. The first was that  the onset of the symptoms is 5–10 days after infection. Picking a mid-point in that range assures us that people who are infected are beginning to appear in the data. Secondly, a cursory check of the data suggests that reported numbers dip lower on weekends. And so making a week-long average covers any possibility of lower values at week’s end.

That preface out of the way, what do we see? Well, there is some evidence that the curve is flattening in New Jersey. The lines below represent that rolling average. And if you look at the very top of the New Jersey curve, you can see it beginning to flatten.

Flattening curves
Flattening curves

Unfortunately that does not mean New Jersey is out of the woods. Not by a long shot. Instead, that means tens of thousands of people will still be infected. And hundreds more will die. But, the rate at which those two things happen will be lower. Hopefully hospitals will not be as overwhelmed as they presently are. And that might make for a lower total death count.

The data does not support, however, the notion that the curve is flattening in the other states. Consider that the United States spans a continent and contains over 330 million people. The outbreak will look different in different states. Compare Pennsylvania and Illinois, which have similar case numbers. But in Pennsylvania we have more cases in smaller cities and rural areas and fewer in the largest cities. Plus, of course, we have the different measures taken by different states to contain and mitigate the pandemic within their borders.

But, we do have some data to suggest that at least in New Jersey the curve is flattening. I’ll take good news where I can find it. (Even if it comes from Jersey.)

Credit for the piece is mine.

Where’s My Corona? Another Round, Please

This past weekend I continued looking at the spread of COVID-19 across the United States. But in addition to my usual maps of Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, Virginia, and Illinois, I also looked at the number of cases across the United States adjusted for population. I then looked at the five aforementioned states in terms of new cases to see if the curve is flattening. Finally, I looked at the number of hospital beds per 1000 people vs the number of cases per 1000 people.

The latter in particular I wanted to be an examination of hospitalisation rates vs ICU beds, which are a small fraction of total hospital beds. But as I could not find that data, I made do with overall cases and overall beds.

So first let’s look at the cases across the U.S. What you can see is that whilst New York and New Jersey do have some of the worst of the impact, Washington is still not great and Louisiana and Michigan are also suffering.

The situation across the United States
The situation across the United States

And then when we look at the states by their cases per 1000 people and their hospital beds per 1000 people, we see that the states often claimed to be overwhelmed, New York, New Jersey, and Washington are all well over the blue line, which indicates an equal number of beds and cases per 1000 people, or near it. Because it is important to remember that not all beds are the type needed for COVID-19 victims, who often require the more fully kitted out ICU beds. Additionally, not all cases are severe enough to warrant hospitalisation.

Cases per 1k people vs hospital beds per 1k people
Cases per 1k people vs hospital beds per 1k people

Then from the broader national view, we can look at the states of interest. Here, those of you who have been following my social media posts, you can see fewer dark purples in these maps. That’s because I have adopted a new palette that has sacrificed granularity at the lower end of the scale and added it at the top, a particular need in New Jersey and the Philadelphia and Chicago metro areas. And finally we look at the daily new cases to see if that curve is flattening.

Pennsylvania now has almost every county infected. But unlike Illinois, which has a similar infection rate but more unaffected counties, Pennsylvania has fewer cases in its big city, Philadelphia, and has more cases in the smaller cities and towns.

The situation in Pennsylvania
The situation in Pennsylvania

New Jersey is just a disaster. Deaths are now reported in every county—so I can probably remove those orange outlines. The only potential good news is that new cases for the second day in a row were fewer than the day before. It could be a blip. But it could also be a signal that the peak of infection has or is nearing. That said, hospitalisations and deaths are lagging indicators and could take two weeks to follow the positive test results. So in the best case scenario that this is a peak, New Jersey is far from out of the woods.

The situation in New Jersey
The situation in New Jersey

Delaware is the smallest state I look at—and one of the smallest in the union overall—but its cases are worryingly increasing rapidly, although like every state I examine in detail it had fewer new cases Sunday than Saturday.

The situation in Delaware
The situation in Delaware

Virginia is in a better spot overall than the other four states. You can see that in the national map above. And most of Virginia’s cases are concentrated in the DC and Richmond areas as well as the cities along the peninsulas jutting into the Chesapeake.

The situation in Virginia
The situation in Virginia

Illinois is, as noted above, similar to Pennsylvania in terms of infections. In terms of deaths, however, it is doubling Pennsylvania’s numbers. And most of its cases are located in and around Chicago. Big chunks of downstate Illinois are unaffected or lightly affected compared to the Commonwealth.

The situation in Illinois
The situation in Illinois

Finally, as I noted in New Jersey, could these lower numbers Sunday than Saturday be meaningful? Possibly. But in all five states? Highly unlikely. Regardless, we can look at the number of daily new cases and see if that curve of infection is flattening. We should wait several days before beginning to make that assessment. But one can hope.

The case for flattening curves
The case for flattening curves

All of this is to say that things are bad and likely will continue to get worse. But I will keep looking at the data daily and presenting it to the public to keep them informed.

Credit for this piece is mine.

Another Friday, Another Corona with Lime Update

Today is yet another Friday in the pandemic. And so I wanted to just upload a few of the graphics I have been making for family, friends, and coworkers and posting on the Instagram and the Facebook. I did this two weeks ago as well, and if you compare those maps to these, you will see quite a stark difference. But on to today’s maps.

As a brief reminder, I am specifically looking at Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware—the tri-state region for my non-Philly followers—as well as Virginia and Illinois by the request of friends and former colleagues who live in those states. And then at the end I’ve been putting the tri-state region together to provide a fuller regional context.

Lastly, for today only, the Bureau of Labour Statistics published its jobs report about the number of job losses in March across the US. And…it wasn’t pretty.

Conditions in Pennsylvania
Conditions in Pennsylvania

Conditions in New Jersey
Conditions in New Jersey

Conditions in Delaware
Conditions in Delaware

Conditions in Virginia
Conditions in Virginia

Conditions in Illinois
Conditions in Illinois

Conditions in the tri-state region
Conditions in the tri-state region

Plus, the added bonus of the Bureau of Labour Statistics’ monthly jobs report. And spoiler, things aren’t so great out there.

Conditions in the national job market. Not great!
Conditions in the national job market. Not great!

Credit for the work is mine.

 

Modelling the Impact of Not Sheltering in Place or Staying at Home

The administration botched the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic. Only within the last two weeks have states acted to begin enacting dramatic policies aimed at slowing the spread of the virus through their communities. But what policies the federal government has enacted are now threatened by an administration that prioritises the economy and market over the lives of the citizens it leads.  The White House is discussing loosening all the policies of social distancing that health officials and scientists say are necessary to slow the spread of the virus.

This website from CovidActNow.org uses a model to predict the impact state by state of various policies on hospital overcrowding and ultimately deaths. The site opens with a map of the United States showing, broadly, what kind of response each state has followed (understanding things change rapidly these days).

The state of reactions in the United States
The state of reactions in the United States

That also serves as the navigation for a deep dive into those models for that state. Here I have selected my home state of Pennsylvania. It borders New Jersey and New York, two states that revolve, at least in part, around New York City, rapidly becoming the epicentre of the US outbreak, supplanting Seattle and the Pacific Northwest. What would the state face if we allowed things to keep going blithely on? What would happen if we merely socially distance for three months? What if we shelter in place for three months? (Emphasis added by me to show this is a long-term problem.)

Potential outcomes for Pennsylvania
Potential outcomes for Pennsylvania

Turns out that things don’t work out that well if we don’t stay at home, stop travelling, stop socialising. A table below the line charts shows the user how bad things go for the state in a table.

A table of potential outcomes
A table of potential outcomes

As you can see, for Pennsylvania, if we were to continue going on like normal, that would result in the deaths of almost the size of the entire city of Pittsburgh. Imagine if the city of Pittsburgh were suddenly wiped off the state map. That’s the level we are talking about.

Just three months of just social distancing? Well now you’re talking about wiping out just the cities of Allentown and Scranton.

Sheltering in place for three months, statewide? Well, thankfully Pennsylvania has lots of towns around the size of 5000 to choose from. Imagine no more Paoli, or Tyrone. Or maybe a Collegeville or Kutztown. An Oxford or a Media. Pick one of those and wipe it from the map.

Fundamentally the choice comes down to, do you want to restart your economy or do you want to save lives? Saving lives will undoubtedly mean unemployment, shattered 401k plans, bankruptcies, mental health problems, and cities, towns, and industries devastated without a tax base to provide for the necessary services. But, saving those jobs and dollars will means tens if not hundreds of thousands of deaths.

I don’t envy the state executive branches making these decisions.

Pennsylvania has chosen a middle road, if you will. It enacted a stay-at-home policy for seven counties: Allegheny (Pittsburgh); Philadelphia and its suburban counties of Bucks, Chester, Delaware, and Montgomery; and Monroe County. The rest of the state, primarily where the virus has yet to make any real significant appearance or appears to be spreading in the community, is not under the strictest of measures. This site’s model doesn’t account for a partial, statewide stay-at-home, but Pennsylvania’s choice is clearly a far superior one for people who prioritise lives over dollars.

Finally, to the people I have seen from my apartment gathering in parks, partying in outdoor spaces, that I can hear throwing house parties, please stop. If not for you, for the rest of us.

Credit for the piece goes to CovidActNow.org.

The Spread of COVID-19 in Select States

By now we have probably all seen the maps of state coverage of the COVID-19 outbreak. But state level maps only tell part of the story. Not all outbreaks are widespread within states. And so after some requests from family, friends, and colleagues, I’ve been attempting to compile county-level data from the state health departments where those family, friends, and colleagues live. Not surprisingly, most of these states are the Philadelphia and Chicago metro areas, but also Virginia.

These are all images I have posted to Instagram. But the content tells a familiar story. The outbreaks in this early stage are all concentrated in and around the larger, interconnected cities. In Pennsylvania, that means clusters around the large cities of Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and Harrisburg. In New Jersey they stretch along the Northeast Corridor between New York and Trenton (and along into Philadelphia) and then down into Delaware’s New Castle County, home to the city of Wilmington. And then in Virginia, we see small clusters in Northern Virginia in the DC metro area and also around Richmond and the Williamsburg area. Finally in Illinois we have a big cluster in and around Chicago, but also Springfield and the St. Louis area, whose eastern suburbs include Illinois communities like East St. Louis.

19 March county wide spread of COVID-19
19 March county wide spread of COVID-19

19 March county wide spread of COVID-19
19 March county wide spread of COVID-19

19 March county wide spread of COVID-19
19 March county wide spread of COVID-19

19 March county wide spread of COVID-19
19 March county wide spread of COVID-19

19 March county wide spread of COVID-19
19 March county wide spread of COVID-19

I have also been taking a more detailed look at the spread in Pennsylvania, because I live there. And I want to see the rapidity with which the outbreak is growing in each county. And for that I moved from a choropleth to a small multiple matrix of line charts, all with the same fixed scale. And, well, it doesn’t look good for southeastern Pennsylvania.

County levels compared
County levels compared

Then last night I also compared the total number of cases in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware, and Virginia. Most interestingly, Pennsylvania and New Jersey’s outbreaks began just a day apart (at least so far as we know given the limited amount of testing in early March). And those two states have taken dramatically different directions. New Jersey has seen a steep curve doubling less than every two days whereas Pennsylvania has been a bit more gradual, doubling a little less than every three.

State levels since early March
State levels since early March

For those of you who want to continue following along, I will be looking at potential options this coming weekend whilst still recording the data for future graphics.

Credit for the pieces is mine.

The Spread of COVID-19 in Pennsylvania

Over the last several days, along with most of the country, I’ve taken an interest in the spread of the novel coronavirus named COVID-19. Though, to be fair, it’s actually been in the news since early January, though early news reports like this from the Times, simply called it a mysterious new virus.  At the time I thought little of it, because the news out of China was that it did not appear it could spread amongst humans. How did that idea…wait for it…pan out?

Anyway, over the last couple of days I’ve been making some maps for Instagram because people tend to look at a national map and see every nearly state infected when, in reality, there are pockets and clusters within those states. So I started looking at Pennsylvania. And initially, the cluster was along the Delaware River, namely Pennsylvania as well as its upper reaches near the Lehigh Valley and in the far northeast of the state.

But the spread has grown, and fairly quickly, with Montgomery County, a Philadelphia suburb, a hotspot. Consequently, the Pennsylvania governor has shut down all schools across the state and ordered non-essential shops, restaurants, and bars in the counties surrounding Philadelphia—as well as the county containing Pittsburgh—closed.

So 11 days in, here’s where we stand. (To be fair, I looked at including the early numbers out of today, but nothing has really changed, so I’ll wait until the evening figures are released before I update this again.)

Credit is mine. Data is the Pennsylvania Department of Health.