1/ Morning folks. Wondering why @CDCgov is using such aggressive rules for death counts? Look - there's considerable evidence #COVID infections have peaked in the US. Even the POTUS comments last night warning about this being the "toughest week" suggest as much (deaths lag)...

2/ And the emerging data out of Florida, Southern California, etc suggest that this virus - like most respiratory viruses - doesn't do well when the weather warms and UV rays get stronger. Great news! Right? Right? Well... we're at under 9,000 deaths now.

3/ Suppose the president is right. And this is the
"toughest week." And we average 1,500 deaths a day. That gets us to almost 20,000 deaths by April 12. By then the trend should clearly be down, I don't think it will be arguable...

4/ 20,000 deaths, with perhaps that many more coming over the next month (deaths lag). That's terrible! Yeah. It is. But @CDCgov is estimating 24,000-63,000 flu deaths this year. https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/preliminary-in-season-estimates.htm

5/ No wonder @CDCgov is desperately trying to count every #COVID death. Because when people put those two figures together with what we have done to our economy, our kids, and society in the last month...

So as you watch the "toughest week" hysteria, remember what's coming next.