One American is Dying every 107 seconds from COVID-19

It has been ten days since we last updated this space. The SARS-Cov2 virus is running rampant in the USA. The measures taken and those neglected have not depressed the number of daily cases to a plateau low enough to avoid fueling widespread disease increase. There were over 98,000 cases of Covid-19 recorded today, a number which represents the highest daily number since the pandemic began. We have experienced 5 out of the 6 worse pandemic days in the last week! Ten states, including Ohio, are in the mist of record hospitalizations. Forty-three of Ohio’s 88 counties are classified as being in the “red zone”. This means that there is “very high exposure and spread”.  ICU capacities are being reached in multiple locales including El Paso, TX and the states of Utah and Wisconsin. Indoor dining has been banned again in Chicago due to the dramatic increase in cases. We have lost 1,000 Americans for the last two consecutive days. There have been over 229,000 deaths and 9 million Americans infected since the beginning of the pandemic.  We are not “rounding the curve” as declared by the President, according to Dr. Anthony Fauci (Head of the National Institute of Health Allergy and Infectious Diseases). Doctor Fauci declared today that “we’re in for a whole lot of hurt…You could not possibly be positioned more poorly”. Unfortunately, multiple European countries are experiencing surges so severe that economic lockdowns are being imposed.  The history of COVID-19, albeit brief, tells us that the USA trends behind Europe by a month or so. This history does not bode well for November and the holiday season. As the result of the extensively predicted increase in spread, families need to give a lot of forethought to our traditional holiday gatherings.  Remember that 40-50% of infected people are without symptoms and we must consider avoiding gatherings where susceptible older relatives and those with preexisting conditions are potentially exposed to this coronavirus. It is better to plan holiday gatherings for next year than to plan hospital visits and possible funerals after this year’s holidays.

Other items in the news include that the antiviral drug, Remdesivir, has now been approved for the treatment of hospitalized patients. The drug company Regeneron has requested emergency FDA approval for its antibody cocktail which was reportedly given to the President when it was still considered as experimental. Although our expert physicians are learning more effective means of treating this disease and the death rate is declining, there remains no cure. There are long term consequences of Covid-19 involving inflammation in the blood vessels, heart, lungs, and other organs. One study recently published in the Journal of Neurology found that 82% of patients hospitalized for COVD-19 suffered from a neurologic problem at some point in their disease.    

Our hope for real relief from the scourge of COVID-19 rests in the availability of safe and effective vaccines. The two phase III vaccine trials which had been paused were both restarted on October 23.   These pauses collectively account for one of the reasons why the quest for viable vaccines authorization are going to be delayed. Two others are the trials’ difficulty with recruiting ethnically diverse volunteers and a lack of COVID-19 illness in trial participants.  Therefore, our expectations about when the vaccines will be available for wide distribution need to be reset.  Many experts from the pharmaceutical industry, infectious diseases specialty, and the FDA are cautiously optimistic about initial availability in the first part of 2021. 

People, we are not powerless, but we must do the right things to protect our health.  Get your flu shot. Mask wearing (cover your mouth and nose) is essential when you are around others not living in your household.  WASH your hands (20 seconds) or use hand sanitizer after touching any surfaces outside of your home.  Watch your distance and stay at least 6 ft from others and avoid large crowds.  We believe that the USA needs a national plan which leads by exampling mask wearing and social distancing, assures adequate accurate rapid-result testing, and depends on science for guidance.   This will reduce death and despair from COVID-19 while we await vaccines.