Coronavirus: Spreading in Africa?

There have been warnings about the spread of COVID-19 in Africa since the start of this global pandemic. I wrote about it back in October and how the worst fears had yet to occurred. In that post, I wrote about concerns that COVID-19 cases could reach 10 million by October. As we can see in Worldometer, reported cases aren't even at 3 million yet. During much of the pandemic, it also looked like cases were largely isolated to the country of South Africa and various North African countries. Is COVID-19 now spreading throughout Africa?

Let's start by visiting Sorth Africa. The New York Times (Dec 26) reported about the country:

In South Africa, a crush of new cases that spread from Port Elizabeth is growing exponentially across the nation, with deaths mounting . . . Now, as they battle new outbreaks, doctors are convinced that deaths have also gone uncounted. Dr. John Black, the only infectious-disease specialist for adults in Port Elizabeth, said he and other physicians feared that many people were dying at home. Indeed, a government analysis showed that there had been more than twice as many excess deaths as could be explained by confirmed cases in South Africa. “We don’t know what the real number is,” he said.

Coronavirus: Los Angeles and Grocery Stores

The Los Angeles Times (Dec 20) is saying that supermarkets are being hit hard by COVID-19:

Outbreaks are increasing at an alarming rate across industries, officials say — an unavoidable consequence of so many people falling sick in the region. But those at grocery stores and other essential retailers pose a unique challenge for officials attempting to reduce coronavirus transmission, as well as for county residents trying to pare down their activities to only what is necessary. 

. . . County officials estimate that 1 in 80 people in the county are infectious with the coronavirus, the highest prevalence yet recorded. With so many people infected, it’s likelier than ever that a co-worker or customer could be ill, and that a single case could multiply into dozens.

Coronavirus: Sweden Rethinking

Sweden is a well followed case study when it comes to COVID-19. At the moment, per Worldometer, the country is definitely going through a significant second wave. Though in terms of daily cases, the second wave appears to be ebbing and daily deaths have plunged. That is a bit interesting as one would think that deaths would drop after cases dropped.

In my last blog post on the country, I mentioned that the country was putting in tighter restrictions that was focused on sports and concerts. The LA Times (Dec 10) had a recent article that takes another look at the country where tighter "proposals" were recommended:

The healthcare system is now operating close to capacity in many parts of the country. In greater Stockholm, where more than 2 million people live, intensive care units were at 99% of occupancy as of midweek.

. . . The alarming deterioration of the situation is forcing officials to rethink their light-touch approach, which has been the object of both envy and incredulity around the world. This week, the Swedish government proposed a measure to give authorities more sweeping powers to close down shops, restaurants, malls, gyms, banquet halls and other gathering places — a step it avoided taking until now.

Los Angeles Times Festival of Books: Civic Memory and the Future of L.A.

The Los Angeles Times has their annual Festival of Books. This year, of course, the discussion panels are being held online. That's my favorite part of the book festival. This was the 4th panel discussion I watched. This panel discussion was called, "Civic Memory and the Future of L.A." Per YouTube, here's the introduction to the discussion:

 Civic Memory and the Future of L.A. - What and who should be remembered and memorialized across public spaces, and what should such commemorations look like? Members of the Civic Memory Working Group of Los Angeles, a diverse gathering of artists, architects, historians, and others, will explore the ideas and obligations around civic memory (and civic amnesia). Featuring USC Professor Christopher Hawthorne, architects Frederick Fisher and Gail Kennard, and Associate Professor Taj Frazier, moderated by Professor William Deverell.

Christopher Hawthorne - Professor of the Practice in English at USC / Chief Design Officer for City of L.A.

He was at the LA Times for 14 years. He's the chief design officer for L.A., which means he improves the architecture and design of the city. For example, he's working on public art at the LAX expansion. 

The Wealthy Leaving California: just a handful or a trend?

Back in August I wrote about Joe Rogan moving from California to Texas. I mentioned that the top 0.4% of households (estimated at 50,000) in the state paid 40% of the state's income taxes. In the article, I quoted the following:

Of course, CalMatters (Aug 13) reports the general assumption by liberals: 

But history suggests raising income taxes doesn’t drive large numbers of wealthy people away. The Stanford Center on Poverty and Inequality looked at past tax increases, including the 2004 millionaires tax, when voters approved a 1% tax increase on income above $1 million, and Proposition 60 in 2012, which raised the tax rate on the top income bracket from 10.3 percent to its current rate of 13.3, the highest in the nation. Those increases, researchers said in a 2018 paper, led at most 0.04% of the state’s top earners to leave.

I wondered at the time how high taxes could possibly go before the wealthy started to leave the state. Now, I don't know if this is a trend, but additional stories are started to pop up of wealthy people leaving the state.

Coronavirus: 534,000 plus deaths by April 1, 2021?

Back on September 10th, I wrote a blog post where I totally didn't buy the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington forecast that 410,000 Americans would die from COVID-19 by the end of December 31st, 2020. As I write this on December 24th, US deaths are at 337,000 per Worldometer. I can say with certainty that we won't get to 410,451 by Jan 1st. To get there, daily deaths would have to average over 10,000 per day until December 31st. The seven day average at the moment is 2,752. We'll likely end up at deaths between 355,000 and 360,000. To me, that's a relatively big miss. Back in September, they were expecting about 217,000 additional deaths. Let's say we come in with around 163,000 additional deaths. That's a 25% forecast miss.

Per CNN via WMBF (Dec 24), IHME has come up with another forecast. This one is for April 1st:

The University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation released new pandemic models that show the possibility of U.S deaths topping 567,000 by April 1.

Los Angeles Homeless: $130,000 for an 8 Foot by 8 Foot Shelter

It seems like Los Angeles really knows how to over-spend when it comes to sheltering the homeless. The Los Angeles Times (Dec 12) reports on how the city is spending money on temporary shelters, which are just 64 square feet:

At the city’s first tiny home village, scheduled to open in January, each of the 39 closet-sized homes is costing $130,000, about 10 times what some other cities are spending. Five more villages are planned to open later. 

. . . A breakdown provided by the Los Angeles Bureau of Engineering shows that the contract provides $1.5 million just to prepare the site.

Los Angeles Times Festival of Books - Roots to Routes: Immigration and Race in L.A.

The Los Angeles Times has their annual Festival of Books. This year, of course, the discussion panels are being held online. That's my favorite part of the book festival. This was the 3rd panel discussion I watched. This panel discussion was called, "Roots to Routes: Immigration and Race in L.A." Per YouTube, here's the introduction to the discussion:

Roots to Routes: Immigration and Race in L.A. – This first half of a two-part panel on Los Angeles will explore issues of race and immigration in Southern California, both historically and today. Topics include how shifting racial demographics have changed the economy, and California’s impact on politics and immigration nationally. Featuring USC Professors Juan De Lara, Manuel Pastor, and Associate Professor Sarah Gualtieri moderated by Professor William Deverell. 

Here are my notes from what the three panelists said:  

Juan De Lara - Professor American Studies and Ethnicity at USC

He's a trained geographer. His book tells the story of Southern California in the 1980s. He looks at the massive movement of individuals into Southern California through the lens of migration. He looks at how the area became a Latino plurality, a racial shift. Also, how there was economic change that also transformed the landscape. There was a de-industrialization via the decline of aerospace and other manufacturing. The region transformed economically from one that manufactured to one that received goods via importing. 

Coronavirus: California Politicians Don't Seem to Practice what They Preach

California politicians are advocating COVD-19 lockdowns that they themselves don't appear to want to adhere to. I previously discussed Governor Gavin Newsom. Now other politicians are being caught skirting the law. 

KUSI (Dec 1) reports:

San Francisco Mayor London Breed dined at a posh Napa Valley restaurant the day after California’s governor was there. San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo went to his parents’ house for Thanksgiving. And a Los Angeles County supervisor dined outdoors just hours after voting to ban outdoor dining there.

All three local officials were on the hot seat Tuesday after various reports that they violated rules aimed at controlling the spread of the coronavirus — or at a minimum, violating the spirit of the rules as they repeatedly urged others to stay home.

California Budget Issues: West Covina

While watching Bloomberg TV, I noticed a news crawl about the city of West Covina and their budget woes. I decided to go search for the article. 

Bloomberg (Dec 1) reports:

West Covina, California, which sold $204 million of pension bonds in July, is at the fiscal brink because of its ineffective management and raiding of reserves, according to a report Tuesday by State Auditor Elaine Howle.

The southern Californian city of about 105,000 residents helped cover salary and benefit costs for its public safety workers by siphoning from reserves, halving its year-end balance in fiscal 2019 to about $10 million over four years, the report said.

. . . West Covina plans to sell land and use the proceeds to pay down its debt obligations, according to the report. But, such “large one‑time revenue sources will be insufficient on their own to reverse the city’s negative financial trend and rebuild its reserves,” it said.

Los Angeles Times Festival of Books - Roberto Lovato, Author of Unforgetting: A Memoir of Family Migration Gangs and Revolution in the Americas

The Los Angeles Times has their annual Festival of Books, which is occurring over multiple weeks versus just a two day festival. This year, of course, the discussion panels are being held online. That's my favorite part of the book festival so I have a list of 9 panels I plan to watch online. Hopefully, I'll get to watch all of them. The second one was called, "Roberto Lovato, Author of Unforgetting: A Memoir of Family Migration Gangs and Revolution in the Americas." 

This is what the Youtube video had as an introduction:

Roberto Lovato presents an urgent, no-holds-barred tale of gang life, guerrilla warfare, intergenerational trauma, and interconnected violence between the United States and El Salvador in his beautiful and wrenching new memoir. L.A. Times staff writer Esmeralda Bermudez, who was born in El Salvador and raised in Los Angeles and who writes on the lives of Latinos in L.A., will guide the conversation.

Coronavirus: "Long Haulers"

Back in July, I wrote that perhaps 10% - 50% of individuals who recover from COVID-19 end up with long-term health problems. With more data, it looks like the low end of 10% is more realistic. ABC News via Yahoo (Nov 18) reports:

An estimated 10% of people diagnosed with COVID-19 go on to experience prolonged symptoms, according to the British Medical Journal. That translates into over a million Americans who could potentially experience debilitating symptoms long after they've recovered from the infection. 

. . . "You have patients with cognitive dysfunction, you have difficulty concentrating, having very bad fatigue, and also patients who are very [physically] deconditioned," said [Dr. Zijian Chen, director of the Mount Sinai Center for Post-COVID Care in New York City.]

Coronavirus: Who should get the vaccine first?

With coronavirus vaccines ready to go, the question is who should get priority. On CBS This Morning (Nov 30th), Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar stated the standard argument:

"We have at the CDC something called the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), and they have been meeting with us to give us advice on whom — based on the data that we've got on these vaccines and the state of the case, the epidemiology around the country — should we vaccinate first," Azar said. "That's ongoing still. I hope this week we'll get greater clarity from them in terms of their recommendations and our CDC director's views. But be thinking people in nursing homes, the most vulnerable; be thinking healthcare workers who are on the frontlines of most interacting with suspected COVID cases, as the first tranches of people that we'll try to get vaccinated."

Coronavirus: Africa and Vaccines

Per Worldometer, COVID-19 infections have surpassed 2 million in Africa. Various articles that I've read places the population of the African continent at between 1.2 and 1.3 billion. As a coronavirus comparison, India has a population of 1.4 billion and has 9.4 million infections. When it comes to deaths, India is closing in on 150,000 while Africa is just over 50,000. And when it comes to the United States, there simply is no comparison. In a prior blog post in October, I reported on 7 potential reasons for this lack of spread in the continent.

1. Age of the population.

2. Tuberculosis vaccine.

3. Exposure to previous coronaviruses.

4. Experience dealing with Ebola.

5. Lack of global travel.

6. Population spends more time outdoor than other parts of the globe.

7. Quick lockdowns.

For much of this time, the spread was more significant in countries such as South Africa, Morocco and Egypt. But it does look like Ethiopia and Kenya are having a spread of the virus. Kenya specifically looks like it is being hit with a second wave. Once again, the numbers being reported are very small when compared to other continents. For example, South Africa isn't even in the top 50 countries on a case per million basis.

The Associated Press via the New York Post (Nov 19) reports:

The African continent of 1.3 billion people is being warned against “prevention fatigue” as countries loosen pandemic restrictions to ease their economies’ suffering and more people travel.

“We cannot relent. If we relent, then all the sacrifices we put into efforts over the past 10 months will be wiped away,” Africa CDC director John Nkengasong told reporters. He expressed concern that “many countries are not enforcing public health measures, including masking, which is extremely important.”

. . . The African continent has conducted 20 million coronavirus tests since the pandemic began, but shortages mean the true number of infections is unknown.

[World Health Organization’s Africa chief Matshidiso Moeti] worried that in some of Africa’s low-income countries, much of the limited testing capacity has been used on people who want to travel abroad instead of controlling the virus at home.

Of these 20 million tests, Worldometer indicates that around 64% of these tests have occurred in South Africa, Morocco, Ethiopia, Egypt and Kenya. This list looks very similar to the list above in regards to countries with the most infections. These countries represent around 30% of the continent's population. 

Coronavirus: House Parties Driving Infections in Los Angeles

The local Fox station in Los Angeles has been doing some reporting on the underground party scene. Here's what they reported on Nov 26th:

As coronavirus case numbers continue to rise and we face tighter restrictions, it's restaurants that are paying the price. Restaurant owners have expressed fear that the outdoor dining ban, which kicked in Wednesday night, may put them out of business for good.

However, evidence shows it's private parties and large gatherings that are fueling the spread. And so far, nothing has been able to slow it down.

. . . Fast-forward the clock and we're back in Pomona again ahead of this Thanksgiving week, watching as what appears to be underage teens arriving with racks of beer. Others walk in the street with tanks of nitrious. While inside, the party rages on.

We saw officers with the Pomona Police Department arrive. An officer walks up to the house, talks to somebody and then walks back into his car and then drives away.