Question: It’s been a few weeks since we looked at trends in New York and the USA. What’s the latest?
Answer: You’re right, it has been almost 3 weeks since we looked at the trends (see Q&A of 4/20). When it comes to New York, things are indeed improving. When it comes to the United States, the trends are less positive. For ease of comparison and discussion, I’ll present side-by-side figures for New York, the United States, and the US excluding NYS, since NYS has born such a disproportionate burden of COVID-19 disease in the country. The upshot as I see it is: 1) New York continues to improve, but at a slower rate than we’d like; 2) The United States excluding New York is still seeing increases in daily cases and daily deaths. While the country has flattened the curve, we have not yet gotten to the downhill side of it.
- New Cases: New York continues its steady downward trajectory in new cases. The US as a whole shows modest declines in new cases, whereas the US excluding New York shows small increases in new cases. (Figure 1)
- Proportion of Tests that are Positive: New York also continues it’s downward trajectory in the proportion of daily tests that are positive, as does the US as a whole and the US excluding New York. (Figure 2)
- Hospitalizations and Deaths: Importantly, the total number of New Yorkers hospitalized each day is on the decline as is the total number of deaths (Figure 3). All good news! On the not-so-good news front, the decline in hospitalizations and deaths has been slow (see how the natural curves displayed in Figure 3 have long tails). I don’t have hospitalization data for the US, so the tables in Figure 3 are daily deaths. Like New York, daily deaths in the United States have declined, but when we exclude New York, we see that daily deaths in the United States are increasing.
- Case Fatality Rate: The crude case fatality rate in New York has remained stubbornly high at 6.1%, higher than the US as a whole and the US excluding New York. (Figure 4). While New York’s crude case fatality rate seems to have plateaued, the rate for the United States continues to increase.
Finally, if you want to see curves for your state (yes, you do!), check out YJ’s latest post, Is my state ready to reopen? Seeing is believing.
[Data from covidtracking.com]
Figure 1. Daily Cases in New York State are Rapidly Decreasing; in the USA are Slowly Decreasing; and in the USA excluding NYS are Slowly Increasing
Figure 2. Proportion of Tests that are Positive in New York State, USA, and USA excluding NYS is Declining
Figure 3. Daily Number of Hospitalizations and Deaths in New York is Decreasing; Daily Deaths are Slowly Decreasing the US; and Slowly Increasing in the US excluding New York
Figure 4. Crude Case Fatality Rate Remains High in New York; is Increasing in the USA and USA excluding New York
