🦠COVID-19 | Riots on my mind
📊 Daily Data Brief: (June 03, 2020, 03:14 GMT) (❗️Previous data: May 31, 2020, 14:58 GMT)
Cumulative case: 6,485,571 (+285,184) cumulative cases
Active cases: 3,079,521 (+13,731) (this is the number of currently infected patients)
Total Deaths: 382,412 (+10,664)
Serious/Critical Cases: 54,528 (+1,043)
Recovered: 3,023,638 (+367,685)
Source: Worldometers
1) Seven-day rolling average of new deaths (updated daily as ECDC releases). Major update with per country graphs now available (Link) (US, UK, France, Germany, Sweden, Nordic Comparison)
Showing a chart from the FT today highlighting the worrying situation in Brazil, Mexico, India and Russia. Also the FT comparative charts now allow up to 6 countries
2) U.S. states reopening risk map: this analysis includes current estimated R (reproduction number) for each state (Link)
3) Rt estimate per country (NEW❗️). This is a new resource link in the data section from a team which has led accuracy in modelling fatalities in the US for the past few weeks. (Link)
In the last Corona Daily, I wrote that if the current riots in America were badly managed, the COVID-19 pandemic “might be narrated as the catalyst rather than the reaction in America’s future history books. In the last few days, the Twitter timelines of the leading epidemiologists, public health experts and infectious diseases have made increasing mentions of George Floyd death, the ensuing riots and its longer term implications. COVID-19 is suspended and almost second to the ongoing developments.
One of the Twitter threads of the days looks at the potential implication of the riots on the emergence of a second wave, whilst an article in the Boston Review (from May 18) looks at the chronic inequalities in American societies, how they were exposed and exacerbated by COVID-19. We could now add how they provided a strong underpinning to the pent-up rage which exploded with the death of George Floyd. Still staying with the political side of the pandemic, David Leonhardt tweets his own article showing how countries led by illiberal populists have had the worst outcome.
The image of the day is of a survey showing how politicians in the UK are now distrusted by a majority when it comes to information on the pandemic. Thankfully scientists and national health services have only suffered limited collateral damage.
Also included in today’s edition is a podcast and a Science article on two promising vaccine developments. Another article adding a further twist to hydroxychloroquine which was thought to be irremediably defunct following a large scale study highlighting its lack of notable benefits and potential risks. The architect of the Swedish Model has expressed regrets about his own policy and a commission is now being appointed to start a formal inquiry.
A wonderful article in the New York Times looking at the history of science writing and providing guidance on how to approach this ‘literary genre’. The final article in a high quality series on Science and the philosophy of Science in the Boston Review takes a deeper look at the interface of science and policy.
Finally a thread discouraging anyone from travelling from Los Angeles to Beijing.
Twitter threads of the day:
❗️ “Will U.S. riots increase chance of second wave”: Trevor Bedford (Professor at FredHutch)
It is the question that a number of people are asking at a time when people were already worried about a second wave following risky re-openings in a number of US states:
The tragedy is that the core of the protesters are African-Americans which were already disproportionally represented in COVID-19 infections and deaths. It is unknown whether open-air mass events have the risk to be super spreader events as noted by Zeynep Tufekci in Bedford’s thread but jail and detention are already known to be high-risk:
The question then arises as how will epidemiologist be able to assess the risk of mass protests when declaring you have been to one of these events might pose a risk vis-a-vis authorities.
(Twitter thread)
✈️ “What it takes to fly from Los Angeles to Beijing”: this is a thread describing what air travel to China now looks like.
This is another excellent thread on what air travel looks like during a pandemic. The Corona daily has shared a traveller’s (photographer Laurel Chor) experience from Paris to Hong Kong in a previous edition. This one from Los Angeles to Beijing is next level and would definitely discourage you from attempting the journey if you were already doubting:
(Twitter thread)
🏛Image of the day: Jim Waterson writes “Public trust in UK government over coronavirus falls sharply” and includes the graph below.
The above is potentially problematic in a case of a second wave, as effectiveness of policy response depends on deep and trusted engagement with communities:
“There has been a substantial fall in public trust in the media’s coverage of the coronavirus, with the decline largely driven by voters who identify as rightwing. Levels of trust in individual politicians have fallen, providing increased space for conspiracy theories.”
I find it also quite worrying that scientists have also suffered collateral damage, most probably and mainly from U.K. government’s debatable claim that it was “following the science”. Fortunately both “scientists, doctors, experts” as well as “National health organisations” still command a high degree of trust from the public.
The fact that a number of them have publicly dissociated themselves from the government policy should help preserve their trust for the benefit of both the public and their own field going forward.
🛑 Tweet of the day: “Illiberal populists and pandemic response”
It is quite sad to see these four countries bundled together as being led by “illiberal populist’ leaders.
Leonhardt believes that the slowness of the policy response characteristics of these regimes has been flawed:
“Often, leaders who responded more slowly have cited the need to prioritize economic growth. But the trade-offs between the economy and public health may not actually exist, scientists and economists say: The fastest route to economic normalcy involves controlling the spread of the virus.”
A tendencious article title, but the high fatalities in these countries and the common characteristics of their leaders will ring true for a majority.
🦠 Terry C. Jones et al. publish “An analysis of SARS-CoV-2 viral load by patient age”. This is a revision and enriched paper from a previous one published by the same group which had spurred controversy in Germany as it pertained to the potential infectivity of children and the implication for school reopening policy, but also because it came from Christian Drosten’s group.
Drosten is the figure head scientist for the German policy, and even though Germany is the envy of many countries, he has come under criticism from the anti-lockdown crowd. The paper has slightly toned down its conclusion whilst still urging caution as to the infectivity of children:
“Based on these results and uncertainty about the remaining incidence, we recommend caution and careful monitoring during gradual lifting of non-pharmaceutical interventions. In particular, there is little evidence from the present study to support suggestions that children may not be as infectious as adults.”
(Link)
💉 Jon Cohen writes “Operation Warp Speed selects billionaire scientist’s COVID-19 vaccine for monkey tests” in Science. Cohen reports on the inclusion in the shortlist of 14 prepared by Trump’s Operation Warp Speed of one vaccine candidate from two companies owned by billionaire scientist Patrick Soon-Shiong. The vaccine candidate is built on a modified adenovirus Ad5 vector encoding SARS-CoV-2 ‘spike’ protein. The modification aims to suppress a known drawback of using Ad5 vectors as seen in previous HIV vaccine candidates. A great read. (Link)
💊 Matthew Herper and Drew Q Joseph write “Top medical journals raise concerns about data in two studies related to Covid-19” for STAT news. It was believed that a previous large scale trial had dashed any hope of hydroxychloroquine ever advancing as a potential treatment for COVID-19 (including the WHO halting its ongoing trial for the drug).
However, and as reported by the authors two top journals (including the one which published the study) are now question the published results:
“Serious questions have been raised about the reliability of the findings reported in this paper,” Richard Horton, the editor of the Lancet, where the hydroxychloroquine study was published, wrote on Twitter.
Eric Rubin, the editor of the New England Journal of Medicine, which published the study of heart drug safety, struck a similar tone.
The study raises broader issues about these “big database” studies and the difficulty of properly running these large scale studies.
An audit of the data used in the study is currently being audited. To be continued. (Link)
🇸🇪 Richard Milne writes “Swedish expert admits country should have had tighter coronavirus controls” in the Financial Times.
Anders Tegnell, Sweden’s state epidemiologist, and the architect of the “Swedish model” which had drawn interest from around the world given that it was perceived as being less damaging to the economy, has now been quoted in several newspapers as expressing doubt about the soundness of his policy:
“If we would encounter the same disease, with exactly what we know about it today, I think we would land midway between what Sweden did and what the rest of the world did”
It might be the travel restriction imposed by neighbouring Norway and Denmark, which have both suffered much lower fatalities, which prompted the admission:
As can be seen from the chart above, Sweden has now the highest fatality per capita in the world. It should therefore come as no surprise that a commission is now being appointed to investigate the country’s approach to coronavirus.(Link)
📃 Carl Zimmer writes “How You Should Read Coronavirus Studies, or Any Science Paper” for the New York Times. A wonderful article by one of the lead science journalist, going through the history of scientific paper publishing, the advent of peer-review and more recently pre-print servers. A short dose of advice on how to read your first science papers, including reading the running commentary of leading scientists on Twitter. (Link).
🦠🏛 Jonathan Fuller (Assistant Professor of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Pittsburgh) writes “From Pandemic Facts to Pandemic Policies”. The Boston Review has published a beautiful series of essays on Science and the philosophy of Science. This is the concluding essay by Fuller who had also opened the series. He makes a useful observation about the interface of science and decision makers:
“It is worth remembering, therefore, that models and evidence are not the only inputs into the decision-making process. Values are also needed to animate the facts and move decision-makers to action. Public health decisions are infused with values, even when those values are unacknowledged and only implicit. These values trickle down to influence the science informing public health.”
A worthy read on the intersection of science, policy making and the public. (Link)
🏛 Rajan Menon and Jeffrey Kucik write “We're Not All In It Together” in the Boston Review. This article is all the more noteworthy that it was written on May 18 way before the death of George Floyd. It rightly stated then:
“It serves as a stark reminder of America’s deep, far-reaching economic and race-based inequalities, placing some segments of society in a privileged position while limiting the agency and life prospects of others.”
The authors go through the massive inequalities in American society and how COVID-19 has exacerbated them. They also look at some of the anomalies even in the CARES act legislation meant to support the economy where a lot of the funds ended up in the hands of wealthy individuals or corporations.
While the authors see the pandemic as potentially catalysing a reset, it is by no means a given. Campaign financing and polarisation of politics might preserve the status quo rather than uprooted it. It is almost depressing to think that the situation would need to get much worse than now for a necessary change to happen. (Link)
🎙 💉 Podcast of the day:
Kerri Miller and Breann Schossow host“Researchers discuss vaccine development, continued efforts on novel coronavirus” for MPR news (35 min) (Link)
“Join Kerri Miller on our weekly show focusing on the science of the novel coronavirus as she talks with two researchers about how the vaccine development process works and the speed of the science happening during a pandemic. We’ll also answer your questions.”
There is also a great Twitter Thread from Angela Rasmussen (Virologist at Columbia ) one of the two researchers in the podcast with Deborah Fuller (Professor of microbiology at University of Washington) focussing on the pre-print on the latter’s lab work on a promising RNA replicon-based vaccine:
