Too Smug....?

Number of cases of COVID-19 exploded [Ed. Note: Who are you - the Toronto Star?] in Canada yesterday.

[As always, click the graphs to zoom in.]

And more unfortunately, deaths even more so.

One rural Ontario retirement home had nine residents die.

And of the 65 residents, 35 are infected and more than a third of the home's staff, 24, tested positive, with 10 more results pending.  Heartbreaking.

Update: three more seniors died this morning.


So....Too Smug?
I have been wagging my finger at some provinces with high infection rates.  Don't they get it?  Don't they get how serious this is?

It's the usual "bad actors": Quebec, BC, Alberta.

However, in my defense, I had also been saying Ontario's numbers might be somewhat low, as it was trying to clear a backlog of un-analyzed tests.  And Ontario also has had a low testing rate. Could those be contributing to Ontario's perceived low infection rate.

Well, that is the biggest understatement made!  Here is a graph of testing rates per million population;

Ontario sits dead last!  Disgraceful.

No idea we were that low!

And some of the perceived biggest offenders are the largest testers (Quebec, BC & Alberta).

So maybe these bad actors do get it.  They are taking it seriously.

Well past time for Ontari-ari-ari-io to get with it as well.

If they do, get ready to see a big move up the infected leaderboard.

COVID-19 March 29

869 new Canadian cases on March 29th.  Mainly in Ontario (362) and Quebec (342).

Likely (hopefully) the result of clearing some of the testing backlog.  Time will tell....

[As always, click the graphs to zoom in.]

 And here is how the provinces are faring.  Not much of a change from yesterday.

Except Canada's rate increased from 144  cases per million population to 168.

Other countries:

• Spain 1,822
• Italy   1,616
• USA     431  (New York: 3,068!)

The impact on Canada?

The fact that everybody is "staying home" is having a major impact on world crude prices.  That and the Saudi/Russian price war.

The benchmark WTI (West Texas Intermediate) Crude is at $20/barrel.  In January it was $60!

What's worse for Canada - as our economy is so dependent on revenue from the oil and gas sector, whether you like it or not -  is the price of Canadian crude.

Unbelievably, Western Canadian Select is now selling for $6 a barrel! 

$6!!

That's less than a frickin' cup of coffee at Starbucks!!

This may not end well for the Canadian economy.

What's the expression: the cure may kill the patient...

Okay Class

For today's lesson, we will drill down into what the hey is going on with our neighbours to the south, in the good old US of A.

Even though the US is in relatively good shape compared to the rest of the world....

[As always, click the graphs to zoom in.]

[There it is in the, relatively good, lower left part of the graph.]

....when you drill down into the state by state details, some big differences appear.

No surprise that New York is leading the US virus parade.  By a long way.

Which countries could be compared?

Well, Italy & Spain are well off the charts to to upper right (the not good section).

But New York is doing worse than both Switzerland and Iran (added below in red).

I guess New Yorkers don't take kindly being told what to do, to practice "social distancing".

Of course, things have been moving very quickly recently, when less than three weeks ago, during a March 11th press conference, New York's mayor, Bill de Blasio, told people to not avoid restaurants, not avoid normal things that people do.  "If you’re not sick, you should be going about your life.” 

But things changed quickly. Three days later he closed their schools and then the bars and restaurants.  But maybe by then that old horse had left the barn.   Dunno. 

And, of course, New Orleans didn't cancel Mardi Gras, so Louisiana is paying the price. 

Anyway, here are yesterday's Canadian stats....

Are new cases leveling out? too soon to tell.

Could be just slower testing.

But at least a lot better than many places in the world.

And if you are in Ontario - even with all the freaking out lately - we are in a lot better shape than most of the provinces.....

[The red line is the Canadian average of 144.]

Some More Perspective

Not to downplay the seriousness of the Canadian COVID-19 situation,but if we look around the world, many, many countries are in more serious situations than we are.

Previously I showed a chart of per capita cases; cases per 100,000 of population.

[As always, click the graphs to zoom in.]

Canada is fairly far down the list. Although things change quickly.

So I'm here adding an additional view.  If number of cases shows the breadth or depth of the contagion, deaths would show the seriousness of it.

So here are a couple of graphs showing "Cases per million population" on the vertical axis and "Deaths per million population" on the horizontal axis.

As suspected, poor old Italy & Spain are in the upper right hand corner; high cases, high mortality rate.

Little San Marino, a tiny little enclave within - you guessed it -Italy, is the worst in the world, off the chart. So is tiny Iceland (upper left); a lot of cases, not so many deaths....so far.

For all we hear of the US and China, they are relative pikers in all this.  Way down in the lower left corner.

Where is the Great White North?

Canada is also tucked way down the in the lower left corner.

Let's drill down into that corner.  I guess you could call that the good corner,,,,,at least for now.

Even when you drill right down into the "good corner" we are in pretty good shape.  By the way, I guess I should end every sentence with.....so far.

Is the rest of the world freaking out as much as we are?

I don't know.  But we are certainly not alone in all this.

So on to today's stats.  Well, yesterday', really.

It looks like the rate of increase of cases has slowed, just a little.

That's good news, but two factors tell me this is just temporary;

1. In Ontario, at least, there is a backlog of over 10,000 tests waiting for results.  If 3% come back positive (about the going rate of positive test results) that is another 300 alone in Ontario.
2. Again, in Ontario at least, they are going to double the number of tests within a week, from ~2,500/day to 5,000.  That will certainly increase the number of positive cases.  The good news is, getting a better handle on who is infected can only help.

Okay, so much for doom and gloom, on to today's joke.

There is no joke.  That's the joke!


[Ed. Note: You seem to have a lot of time on your hands.  You think you'd be able to come up with one damn joke!]

Not So Fast

Although it looks like the number of Canada's new COVID-19 cases have dropped, it is only because yesterday's numbers were inflated by 800 Quebec "Probable" cases becoming 800 "Confirmed".

So if you ignore yesterday's number of ~1,400, still a large increase form the previous day.

[As always, click the graph to zoom in.]

Now I guess they are trying to sell newspapers or whatever, but interesting that the media always call it a spike in new cases, or a surge, or deaths have skyrocketed.

Always with the hyperbole.

I am outraged and incensed when they do this!!

Just give me the data and let me decide on which adjective to use.

Some Perspective

It is still early in Canada's fight against this invisible foe, but let's look at data from around the world.

For comparison purposes, I'll look at it on a per Capita basis;  cases per 100,000 of population.

The world average is 5;  415,000 cases worldwide on a population of 7.8 billion souls.

Canada's average is also 5.   [Again, click any graph to zoom in.]

But sweet mother, poor Spain and Italy.

And Switzerland?  What's up with that. Apparently, there had been unknown cases at a ski chalet and the country was very slow to pick up on this.  And when people went home - and not just home in Switzerland - they took it with them.

Of course, for the world average to be 5, there has to be many, many, many countries less than this.  So far, at least.....

If we drill down into Canada.....

Ontario don't look half bad....so far....

So here are today's stats.

And, as predicted, our friends in Quebec did it to us this time.

Those ~800 "Probable" Quebec cases shown in yesterday's post have, now come home to roost - they all reflected in today's "Confirmed" numbers.

So...updating the above provincial numbers with the Quebec additions.....

...puts Quebec at the top of the heap for number of cases.  And doubles Canada's per captia rate.

As widespread testing continues to increase, I suspect we will see these numbers continue to increase as well, before we can even hope for a turnaround.....

Grocery Shopping in Florida During the Pandemic

We interrupt our usual doom and gloom reporting of all things Corona-virus with an information item from the Sunshine State.

Our regular dour programming will resume tomorrow....

I'm Not So Sure.....

Something fishy with today's WHO (World Health Organization) stats.  These are significantly lower than the Government of Canada stats.

On which the WHO reports are supposedly based.

So here is the WHO report.

Can't believe the # of new cases is so low.  In fact, don't believe it.

And here is the graph based on Government of Canada data.

And it is not due to just a day's lag in reporting.

Looks a little more reasonable.  Unfortunately.

The big Matzo ball out there, however - and not included in these numbers - is that Quebec has almost 800 "probable" cases.

Which, if confirmed, would quadruple their number of cases.  Quadruple, I tell you!!

Mon Dieu!

Up, Up And Away

Another large increase in positive COVID-19 cases in Canada.

Although on a slightly more encouraging note, although we now have over 1,400 positive cases, that is out of 103,000 people tested.  That works out to a 1.4% infection rate.

And even better, that is only 1.4% of people tested, people who are deemed to beat risk, people who are suspected of having the virus or exhibiting symptoms.

That being said, there is likely a huge backlog of required testing.

So....stay tuned......

I'm Back, Baby!

But only as a public service.....

Not to be a purveyor of more doom and gloom, when around us is all doom & gloom, but publishing this as a way to watch us turn the corner on this invisible foe, this COVID-19.

This graph - based on the daily Situation Reports from the World Health Organization - documents the number of new COVID-19 cases in Canada (blue bars) and the total number of cases (orange bars).

As you can see, the orange bars are "off the charts", but it is only the new cases I am interested in.

The new cases will, unfortunately, continue to rise.  But, at some point, they will start to decline.

And if the Chinese are any example, they will eventually drop to zero.

So stay turned as we straddle this bumpy ride together.

[Double click the graph to get a better view.]