Fauci Was Right. Again. US Cases Top 100K In a Day.

As we were warned in testimony from Dr. Anthony Fauci in late June, the worst is now upon us. The United States of America reported 100,000 new COVID infections in a single day. Nearly 35 states reported at least 1,000 new cases today — a new record.

There is no long-winded diary or wordy narrative that can capture the gravity of that, or the enormity of the situation we are now in.

For several weeks now, Governors and leaders of states red, blue and everywhere in between have been in no position to roll out any sort of comprehensive, serious mitigation measures to control the spread.

For at least a few, if not several more weeks, the resolution of the 2020 election will render us unable to focus our collective attention where it belongs. The media is already counting the eyeballs on what will almost certainly be a week long “news event of a lifetime”. It will almost certainly demolish the gaudy records set in 2016, and completely box out COVID for at least several days.

So, COVID-19, which does not sway Democratic or Republican, nor show much interest in the outcome of the election, will spread like a massive, uncontrolled wildfire through the United States. Hospitals in Utah, Montana, SW Texas, Wisconsin and rural Kansas/Missouri/Nebraska — among others — are already beyond full and debating how to ration care. At 100,000 cases a day, the flow-through hospitalizations and deaths are on the way, putting dozens if not hundreds more hospital systems at risk. And half the country will insist on “giving thanks” in person, indoors, at family gatherings one month from now. In case we needed another dose of fuel on the fire.

If we assume the typical percentages of hospitalizations and time period for progression after infection, the new infections we record next week, while we are focused elsewhere, will begin to manifest as new hospitalizations at or near the end of November. Right about when flu season starts peaking.

It’s fairly natural and easy to understand how nervous and tense we are about Tuesday’s results. But as quickly as cases are now spiking and how little time it took us to jump all the way up to a previously unthinkable diagnosis record for a single day, our greatest fears about the election might pale in comparison to what we are now almost assuredly going to experience due to COVID over the next 90-120 days.

If only we had listened to Dr. Anthony Fauci when there was time.