The following graphs were taken from the John Hopkins CSSE Covid-19 Dashboard issued today, 5 May at 3:21 PM PDT. In all of the following graphs time is on the X axis and number of Covid-19 cases is on the Y axis. The scale is not the same on the Y axis for all graphs. Each graph can be clicked for an expanded view.
This is New Zealand's curve. Notice that the curve flattens, but the slope does not go to zero. New Zealand has gained control of transmission, but not completely stopped it. New Zealand adopted aggressive social distancing and quarantined all incoming travelers, a result directly contradicting the "Professor's" statement that social distancing doesn't work.
This is the United States curve. The rising line is straight indicating about the same number of new Covid-19 confirmations are made each day. This despite a dramatic slowing of new confirmations in New York.
This is Oregon's curve. Like the US curve, the slope is fairly straight.
This is South Dakota's curve. South Dakota has 1/5th the population of Oregon but surpassed Oregon in confirmed cases yesterday, 8 May. South Dakota, which has no "stay at home" order, is experiencing an increasing rate of transmission which results in an increasing number of daily cases confirmed.
When I first started watching the John Hopkins University Dashboard, there were 22 states with fewer Covid-19 confirmations than Oregon. Now there are 10. The states trailing Oregon in Covid confirmations have less or significantly less population than Oregon. By comparison, New Zealand and Oregon are almost identical in land area and population. Arguably Oregon, by virtue of its social distancing efforts, has been more successful than states with weaker social distancing requirements, but has not come close to achieving New Zealand's success.
Here is a bar graph of Oregon's Covid-19 confirmations by date:
Covid-19 is highly contagious and, despite the social distancing measures in place, all we Oregonians have accomplished is changing exponential growth to linear growth. The last few days of the graph are flashing red that transmission is increasing, even after taking out the presumptive cases of Covid-19 now included in the daily tally.
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All this talk about the cure being worse than the disease misses that most people are changing their behavior to reflect their fears of Covid-19. Sorry, there is absolutely no way the economy comes back without an effective vaccine and/or effective treatment no matter how much distancing policies are liberalized or even abolished. IMOP it will take decades to repair the damage.
And as for the professor. Very nice "hang your hat article" that cherry picks a whole bunch of sources that are more opinion than science but sound plausible.
I wish all this weren't so. Stay safe everybody. And buckle up, cause we are no where near the end of this historic pandemic.
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PS. If you think this is bad, here's Russia's curve. It closely resembles the classic exponential growth curve.