The Georgia experiment - Printable Version
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The Georgia experiment - needle - 05-10-2020
Georgia allowed gyms, barber shops and bowling alleys, among other businesses, to re-open April 24.
Limited dine-in restaurant service was allowed to begin April 27. (It should be noted that many restaurants decided against re-opening on this date.)
List of business categories reopening in Georgia: https://www.11alive.com/article/news/health/coronavirus/georgia-reopening-dates-plan-kemp/85-1df2aa97-48fd-4cf8-a9fd-afbd8c73dfcf
As I type this it's May 10, so we're really just barely leaving behind the two-week window that's the incubation period for the covid-19 illness. What will we see from now going forward?
Below is the link with the Georgia Covid-19 data. It appears the state had been experiencing a clear downward trend in the number of new cases. What effect will the reopening have on this trend?
Friday, April 24
Confirmed new cases: 797
7-day average: 739.4
Friday, May 8
Confirmed new cases: 51
7-day average: 258.6
https://dph.georgia.gov/covid-19-daily-status-report
RE: The Georgia experiment - OutsiderFan - 05-10-2020
(05-10-2020, 08:21 AM)needle Wrote: Georgia allowed gyms, barber shops and bowling alleys, among other businesses, to re-open April 24.
Limited dine-in restaurant service was allowed to begin April 27. (It should be noted that many restaurants decided against re-opening on this date.)
List of business categories reopening in Georgia: https://www.11alive.com/article/news/health/coronavirus/georgia-reopening-dates-plan-kemp/85-1df2aa97-48fd-4cf8-a9fd-afbd8c73dfcf
As I type this it's May 10, so we're really just barely leaving behind the two-week window that's the incubation period for the covid-19 illness. What will we see from now going forward?
Below is the link with the Georgia Covid-19 data. It appears the state had been experiencing a clear downward trend in the number of new cases. What effect will the reopening have on this trend?
Friday, April 24
Confirmed new cases: 797
7-day average: 739.4
Friday, May 8
Confirmed new cases: 51
7-day average: 258.6
https://dph.georgia.gov/covid-19-daily-status-report
Those numbers really are hard to believe. Even states that have stayed shuttered are experiencing growth still. But Georgia, a state that lifted restrictions, is seeing the decreases?
https://www.ledger-enquirer.com/news/coronavirus/article242416536.html
RE: The Georgia experiment - dabigv13 - 05-10-2020
Wait one more week.
RE: The Georgia experiment - chrisk - 05-10-2020
The most recent dates are not meaningful for 2 reasons
1) the test results are backdated to reflect the onset of symptoms so the most recent dates are not comparable
2) it is too soon for the results of reopening to be reflected
RE: The Georgia experiment - OutsiderFan - 05-10-2020
So it looks like Georgia found a way to create a graph that makes it appear case numbers are going down by changing how it counts them, in concert with lifting restrictions.
*Golf Clap*
RE: The Georgia experiment - magnus - 05-10-2020
I was going to point out that numbers listed in the last week (their website says 14 days) are often backfilled up to a week later as new reporting comes in. In other words, even though cases only increased by 30 yesterday, 15 might be attributed to yesterday in the chart, 5 from two days ago and maybe 10 from 3 days ago. I would suggest waiting a week to get a better idea of the real numbers for yesterday or 2 weeks to get a near final count.
In general, the way most states/ counties appear to be reporting, you can't compare the last day increase to the daily graph because they are based on two different reporting methods.
Looks like outsiderfan's link mentions this and other reasons as potential reasons for Georgia's steep decline.
RE: The Georgia experiment - burger - 05-10-2020
(05-10-2020, 08:58 AM)dabigv13 Wrote: Wait one more week.No, wait a few more weeks.
Remember, it's about a week from infection to symptoms and then maybe another week until you're sick enough to end up in the hospital. Plus, exponential growth is slow initially (in absolute numbers). So I wouldn't expect the dial to move a lot until maybe June.
RE: The Georgia experiment - JustAnotherFan - 05-10-2020
(05-10-2020, 09:15 AM)burger Wrote:(05-10-2020, 08:58 AM)dabigv13 Wrote: Wait one more week.No, wait a few more weeks.
Remember, it's about a week from infection to symptoms and then maybe another week until you're sick enough to end up in the hospital. Plus, exponential growth is slow initially (in absolute numbers). So I wouldn't expect the dial to move a lot until maybe June.
Sadly the media will run with this and this is going to be plastered all over social media. The narrative, like Sweden, will be that lockdowns don't actually help. Look at this one location at this one moment in time. That's the narrative that sticks. Then as things change over the coming weeks people let it pass because it doesn't jive with what they have told themselves to be true. And then we all pull out our hair asking WTF?!?!
RE: The Georgia experiment - oldalum - 05-10-2020
(05-10-2020, 09:03 AM)magnus Wrote: In general, the way most states/ counties appear to be reporting, you can't compare the last day increase to the daily graph because they are based on two different reporting methods.Yes, Santa Clara County changed to this method a few weeks ago and warned that the previous 5 days' results are incomplete and will be filled in as more results are received. So you just have to ignore the most recent 5 days on the graph. But the daily total new positive results are still informative, and in SCC they have been clearly lower than before for some time, and you can see that reflected in the graph.
RE: The Georgia experiment - Goose - 05-10-2020
(05-10-2020, 09:15 AM)burger Wrote: No, wait a few more weeks.
Remember, it's about a week from infection to symptoms and then maybe another week until you're sick enough to end up in the hospital. Plus, exponential growth is slow initially (in absolute numbers). So I wouldn't expect the dial to move a lot until maybe June.
One other thing we don't know is to what extent (if any) the Georgia counties are able to contact trace and cut down on spread that way. I doubt they are "ready" there either, but if they are it could help a lot. Rt below 1, however achieved, is required. I sure hope they can do it, but I really have my doubts given what (admittedly little) I know.
Unfortunately, I think we in California are also pretty much in the dark about what our counties and state can actually do in this regard. I see no reports of the number quarantined people corresponding to the number of detected cases. When they start publishing that data, then we will have some idea how it is going. Until then, who knows?
RE: The Georgia experiment - fullmetal - 05-10-2020
If you look at the Georgia mobility numbers from Apple/Google, people have not meaningfully increased their distance traveled since the restrictions were lifted. That's good overall, but it will fuel the naysayers who will claim that restrictions never helped in the first place. The goalposts keep moving in the realm of public discussion (or is it public dunking?), but at least lives are not being put on the line as could have happened.
RE: The Georgia experiment - burger - 05-10-2020
(05-10-2020, 09:37 AM)JustAnotherFan Wrote: Sadly the media will run with this and this is going to be plastered all over social media. The narrative, like Sweden, will be that lockdowns don't actually help. Look at this one location at this one moment in time. That's the narrative that sticks. Then as things change over the coming weeks people let it pass because it doesn't jive with what they have told themselves to be true. And then we all pull out our hair asking WTF?!?!
Yeah, this "<state X that opened up> is doing fine" narrative worries me a lot. Ant it's not just social media. I'm sure in like 2 weeks NPR will be reporting on how "epidemiologists got Georgia wrong" or something like that despite it still being too soon to know the outcome.
The really scary thing is that if Georgia does fail at this, by the time the numbers are big enough to be noticeable, it'll be too late. We'll have a large enough number of cases that they'd be locked in to a certain number of deaths even with a second round of closures.
The whole thing is just dumb. About half of US governors are bona fide idiots.
RE: The Georgia experiment - dabigv13 - 05-10-2020
(05-10-2020, 09:15 AM)burger Wrote:(05-10-2020, 08:58 AM)dabigv13 Wrote: Wait one more week.No, wait a few more weeks.
Remember, it's about a week from infection to symptoms and then maybe another week until you're sick enough to end up in the hospital. Plus, exponential growth is slow initially (in absolute numbers). So I wouldn't expect the dial to move a lot until maybe June.
Sure, some people take two weeks to get hospitalized, but others will just take a few days. If they are doing adequate testing they will see the start of the spike after two weeks. May be slower than the initial peak with some degree of distancing and masks.
Leftcoast - Leftcoast - 05-10-2020
All of the above is true but we should still wish Georgia well.
There will be 50 different approaches to reopening given the US federalist system and the absence of strong national guidance - which means 50 individual experiments. Georgia seems to be throwing their hopes behind southern summer heat and humidity allowing liberal opening policies.
We can learn something from each state’s experiment and need at least one to succeed.
Cheers to all Cardboarders everywhere. Stay safe.
RE: The Georgia experiment - Mick - 05-10-2020
(05-10-2020, 10:04 AM)fullmetal Wrote: If you look at the Georgia mobility numbers from Apple/Google, people have not meaningfully increased their distance traveled since the restrictions were lifted. That's good overall, but it will fuel the naysayers who will claim that restrictions never helped in the first place. The goalposts keep moving in the realm of public discussion (or is it public dunking?), but at least lives are not being put on the line as could have happened.
Here's a couple of dozen state rankings and where Georgia falls (California figures in parentheses):
https://www.americashealthrankings.org/explore/annual/measure/Obesity/state/GA
#40 (#19) in diabetes
#38 (#17) in cardiovascular deaths
#37 (#10) in physical inactivity
#30 (#5) in obesity
#41 (#28) in primary care physicians
Only #12 #23) in excessive drinking. Good news at last.
RE: The Georgia experiment - Snorlax94 - 05-10-2020
Related to exponential growing slowly at first: in Georgia, what a dangerous set of openings does is it enables mass-spreading events, but that does not guarantee that it will happen in any particular timeline.
I think of that small cafe in Northern California that violated SIP restrictions by permitting what looks like 50 dine-in customers at a time to pack into their very small room. But the case counts on that county are so low that no one positive may eat there the first day, the first week, the first two months. But unless Covid is exterminated from that town permanently, eventually, someone infectious will dine in that tiny, packed little restaurant and infect 30 people, and then that small town will be in trouble.
I’m glad to hear Georgians are not packing together although their governor has permitted gyms and movie theatres to re-open. Additionally, no new movies have been released, which limits the risk from theatres. After a Shelter-In-Place is lifted, maybe no one in a theatre or gym is infectious, in every gym and theatre, day after day. But they’re permitting some dangerous spaces re-open. Without any changes, eventually, one day, a very infectious person will be dining inside a restaurant, then may go to a semi-crowded gym, and may infect their hairdresser. 20-50 people may be infected from a theatre (depending on how crowded and how well ventilated it was), and then those 20-50 people have, under Georgia’s loose rules, the choice to go to another somewhat crowded venue and to have close contact at salons.
It may take a while, but permitting mass spread and close contact venues means it could happen at any time. Movie theatres should not open until case counts are much, much lower with terrific testing and contact tracing in place. With still relatively high case counts and venues like movie theatres being open, all it takes is one unfortunate super-active, super social, pre-symptomatic spark.
RE: The Georgia experiment - fullmetal - 05-11-2020
I think both Georgia and Texas have similar partial restrictions on open businesses, such as continued social distancing, PPE, customer headcount limits (25% of max in TX), etc. This may not be the wisest idea, but it is far from the wild west re-opening that some have been worried about. Most prudent people will continue avoiding discretionary outings anyway. I suspect we'll see the most cavalier business-as-usual people in the first wave as they repeatedly expose themselves to minor-to-moderate risk situations.
If you keep going to packed places like that Colorado diner flouting their governor's rules, then all bets are off...they may have the chance to meet the consequences of their own actions.
RE: The Georgia experiment - 2006alum - 05-11-2020
FWIW, OpenTable reservations are still down year-over-year by close to 100% in most of the states that are reopening. As of yesterday, 5/10, Florida was at -89% of 2019, Georgia at -92%, and Texas at -83%. What's not clear to me is how any restaurant that's operating at 10-15% of normal stays afloat. Maybe it's all PPP money that's covering payroll and expenses right now, but this article suggests that a lot of small businesses plan additional rounds of layoffs as soon as their mandatory two months of employee payroll are up. This article really hammered home how depressing the middle-term economic future is, and how little anyone seems to realize it:
[tweet]https://twitter.com/washingtonpost/status/1258821229529743363?s=20[/tweet]
RE: The Georgia experiment - BostonCard - 05-11-2020
I found this real time tracker to be useful:
https://tracker.opportunityinsights.org/
It basically looks at consumer spending across a range of categories. Overall, consumer spending is down 20% compared to March 15 (hey, I'm doing my part; I bought a car). That's actually up from -30% in mid-April. Three sub-categories are down more than 50%: restaurants & hotels, entertainment & recreation, and transportation (healthcare is down about 50%). Only groceries are up compared to baseline.
You can look by state, too.
BC
RE: The Georgia experiment - fullmetal - 05-11-2020
Damage to the economy = money that people are deciding not to spend because they feel unsafe in public (or they feel socially responsible).
The quicker we can get to a safe place (vaccine, herd immunity, etc), the quicker the damage is reversed.
Also, does anyone have figures on how much of the total economy is comprised of essential industries that have remained open? One of my pet peeves is the lazy assertion online that "the entire economy is shut down and we are killing our country."