My “breadth” measure of US COVID cases, which is # of States with 1,000+ cases per day just hit a new high, 21 States

Looking at UK and France having massive spikes (2-3x worse than April), US about to explode to 100k+ per day

1/N

Luckily treatment is far better, and a lot of people infected are younger, so death rates are far far lower, but it’s worrying from an economy perspective as Gen X and Boomers won’t be venturing out so much to spend if lots of virus around @RaoulGMI mentions this a lot

2/N

Govs are not going to lock down in Western countries unless it gets horrendous, and luckily as far more people wearing masks and washing hands the normal flu season is likely to be very mild (in Japan so far it’s been almost non-existent!)

3/N

Having far fewer people in hospitals due to flu will free up capacity for the new wave of COVID. As per Apr/May the key question is whether hospitals are overwhelmed or not - let’s hope not!

4/N

Vaccines are due to start INITIAL reporting on Phase 3 trials soon, so this is the first time we shall hear if any of the potential vaccines actually work or not. It’s still a huge effort to distribute if they do work, no way in time to help manage this current wave

5/N

So please remain vigilant, sanitiser, washing hands with soap, masking up and trying to keep away from crowds are sensible things to do - this does work, even if some want to say it doesn’t

FIN