Good evening,

January 29, 2021 – The global pandemic peaked three weeks ago, reporting 3,896,004 new covid-19 infections in the last seven days, which is 9.7% lower than last week. The weekly total of global coronavirus deaths added 99,285 new fatalities, slightly up from last week (+1.4%). In Europe, most countries are struggling with their months-long curfews having only resulted in stabilizing their viral spread, only to see them slowly inching up again towards hospital saturation. This week, many countries in Europe decided to tighten their borders, and lockout visitors from countries infected with the new more aggressive variants: the UK, Ireland, South Africa, Brazil. Portugal, long heralded as a perfect example of contagion management, now in hard lockdown, made a huge mistake over the holidays, welcoming European tourists to enjoy a worry-free vacation to boost the Portuguese economy. The foreseeable cost of that decision is devastating, with the highest incidence of new cases anywhere in the world this week. In the coming days, Portugal will join the top 25 most infected countries, with more covid-19 infections than much larger countries. Neighboring Spain is peaking again. In France, President Macron blinked and gave in to popular pressure to not impose a third lockdown, against the advice of most of his scientists-packed advisory council. In Central and South America, second or third waves are shaping up in Mexico, Peru, Bolivia, Chile, Ecuador, Colombia, Argentina, Paraguay, and Brazil. While India appears to have stabilized its infections spread, Indonesia and Malaysia are peaking again. Japan and South Korea are working hard to squash their recent flares but have yet to reach the low numbers they enjoyed for most of 2020. The overall story is that people are tired of being asked to make efforts and are accepting the deadly cost of the disease, even as the palpable slowdown is producing numbers that still dwarf the peaks of the previous waves. The sputtering vaccination efforts carry a promise for which many have lost patience. One thing is clear: as our behavior facilitates the spread of the virus, we also boost the emergence of new deadlier or more aggressive variants. We are arguably more than halfway on our path to the end of the pandemic, yet the long wait is proving too much for many.

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The national peak of new daily cases is now three weeks old, but 34 states still reported at least 1,000 new COVID-19 infections in the last 24 hours, with a slow yet steady daily nationwide upward trend since last Sunday. Today the nation reported 169,033 new coronavirus infections and covid-19 has killed 3,652 Americans in the last 24 hours, after reporting over 4,100 daily deaths on two of the last seven days. The national hospitalization numbers are down but still high: 116,264 (-15% week-to-week) covid-19 patients are now hospitalized in the United States, with 19,609 (-12%) in ICU and 6,483 (-12%) people fighting for their life currently on ventilators. In the last 7 days, covid-19 has killed 23,245 Americans (+4.1%) and infected 1,118,077 more of our neighbors (-13.4%).

COVID-19 in the USA

This week, California's coronavirus infections totals are 25% lower than they were last week, but more Californians (3,847) have died from covid-19 this week than any other week (14% higher than last week). More patience, diligence, vaccinations, and compassion are needed to beat the virus. If we all do our part, we could consider that we are past the midpoint of this pandemic, but that will only be confirmed if we all stay vigilant.

1/29/2021: Reporting 77 cases from the public, 5 cases from Valley State Prison, and 3 cases from Central California’s Women Facility (total 85 new cases) bringing the total number of reported cases to 14,250. 

Of the 14,250:

Including its prison population, Madera County is averaging 95 new cases per day (60 per 100K), with 667 new cases revealed over the last 7 days. A significant improvement over last week, but we need to get down to an average of 11 cases per day or 77 cases over 7 days to switch from purple to red (from "widespread" to "substantial" contagion risk).

Today, the seven local counties together reported 1,958 new infections and 25 new coronavirus deaths. In the combined 7 counties, COVID-19 has infected 286,281 people and has killed 3,042 residents of our region since it claimed its first central valley victim, in Madera, on March 26, 2020.

COVID-19 in Madera + 6 local counties (+% is the positivity rate)

COVID-19 in the 7 counties together

The worst part of the current wave is now behind us in the Central Valley. The new infections have decreased to the lowest weekly reported cases since the December 4, 2020 report. The total of new deaths is still very high, with only 4 below last week's second-highest watermark. Our decreasing numbers are still at or above last summer's peaks and 1,076 (35.4%) of the total 3,042 covid-19 deaths in the local counties, have occurred since Christmas Day.

Keep observing the simple yet proven safety habits of physical-distancing, mask-wearing, and frequent hand-washing, that will help drive down new infections and new deaths, to a level low enough so as to give us a chance to reopen our schools for onsite education and thus, reopen our economy. Nothing else will work until we have massively administered a safe and effective covid-19 vaccine -- currently estimated by vaccinating up to 85% of the population -- to finally reach herd immunity.