US COVID-19 cases above 94,000

There are now over 94 thousand (according to worldometers.com) documented active cases of COVID-19 out there, and the number of infected people is still climbing exponentially. The Colorado governor issued a "Stay At Home!" order starting March 26, which still allows people to get out for essential activities such as grocery shopping and walking for exercise. I would love to see some evidence that our social distancing approach is helping, but understandably with the long incubation period for this disease, we shouldn't expect to see a reduction in the numbers for weeks - or never, if enough people aren't actually practicing it.

Landon Spradlin Died from COVID-19

We knew there would be stories like this, didn’t we? Even though I had not previously heard of him, I‘m truly sad to learn (from a Newsweek article) that Landon Spradlin, a 66-year-old pastor and traveling musician, has died from COVID-19. I see the picture of this guy in the article, and he looks fairly young and healthy for 66 years old. 

This man earlier claimed COVID-19 was being hyped by the liberal press, to do damage to President Trump’s reputation. I wanted to learn more, so I went to his Facebook page, and found the meme he had posted, with totally bogus numbers and message, claiming that the H1N1 swine flu was far more lethal than COVID-19, and also falsely claiming that the previous administration didn’t take it seriously.

Facebook, which is now doing independent fact checking (which infuriates people who propagate their own agendas by spreading lies), had flagged the graphic as being untrue. They also referenced a very informative article, that explains why you can’t compare a disease which is barely getting started here (and still spreading like wildfire), with a disease that has completely run its course, and was 10 times less lethal.

Y’all be safe out there, please! Wash your hands! Don’t touch your face! Keep your distance!

And please, let's all cross–check our facts, before sharing any memes, *especially* if they really ring a responsive chord in you. Take a deep breath, and realize that fact checkers are not the enemy, simply because they find that something we believe in strongly, is false. Maybe we should research it more deeply, and try to identify and reconsider a false belief to which we may have been clinging.

COVID-19 cases increasing exponentially

I hope everyone is making a valiant effort to shelter in place, or at least continuing with spatial distancing, even if your local government isn’t (yet) mandating this action. The number of document COVID-19 cases in USA is approaching 10,000, and is still increasing exponentially, with the number of new cases also almost doubling each day. This chart of USA cases (from worldometers.info) only shows confirmed cases, and is woefully inadequate, since 1) with fast-moving numbers like these, it’s guaranteed to be obsolete long before you see it and 2) It doesn’t represent all those infected people out there who aren’t showing symptoms yet, but are still out and about, transmitting it to other people. I couldn’t believe all the crowds of kids on Spring Break, that I saw on the news this morning. They all will be going home to their local schools, communities, and families. Oh, boy. Y’all be very careful out there!

Here's an interesting fun fact, if you didn’t know it, from the World Health Organization article that describes the naming: the name for this disease is COVID-19, which stands for “Corona Virus Disease 2019.” The name for the virus itself is SARS-CoV-2, which stands for “Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2.” There is a preference to use the disease name COVID-19, because using the virus name SARS-CoV-2 can cause unnecessary anxiety for some populations, especially in Asia, which was worst affected by the SARS outbreak in 2003.