I watch the numbers in the county where I live, Santa Clara County. Â As with much of California, the COVID cases in the ICU filled essentially all the ICU beds. Â In the last few days, we've come off the tightest numbers, where we got to 5% availability in SCC (and less than 1% (per the state's mangled numbers) in the SF Bay Area).
We also may be starting to drop in daily new cases from the very highest numbers just a few days ago.
But, wait a minute, there should be about a 3 week difference between the peak of new cases and peak of ICU cases.
Here's what the new cases (by date of sample) with 7-day average dark blue line & ICU bed usage (Covid beds orange; non-Covid blue; available gray) graphs look like:
I had always assumed the drop around Christmas Day (214 on 12/25) was an artifact due to people not getting tested (test sites closed and/or results not being returned). Â (The other big drop about Jan. 3 was due to the state's data system being down for maintenance.)
I'm sure that was the cause of much of that drop. Â But maybe that artifact disguised a real drop at the same time with the renewed push to stop the spread at the time. Â I wondered why we didn't see really big numbers immediately after Christmas.
A typical timing is that symptoms (and new cases) appear a week after exposure, hospitalization happens a week to 10-days after symptoms appear, and the patient goes into the ICU a week to 10 days after that.
We are approximately 3 weeks after Christmas. Â I think the drops we are currently seeing in ICU cases are due to a drop that happened around Christmas. Â We will see them pick up again in a few days.
A possible slight drop in new cases in the last few days isn't yet visible in the new case graph. Â It seems to appear if you look at the announced new cases over the last week compared to the new cases the week before. Â 4 out of the last 5 days, the case numbers are down relative to the week before. The remaining day saw a rise of only 2 cases. Â The latest day's drop is the biggest of the drops.
I haven't looked at other counties or larger regions to see if this seems to be true in other parts of the SF Bay Area, or throughout California, or the US.
We also may be starting to drop in daily new cases from the very highest numbers just a few days ago.
But, wait a minute, there should be about a 3 week difference between the peak of new cases and peak of ICU cases.
Here's what the new cases (by date of sample) with 7-day average dark blue line & ICU bed usage (Covid beds orange; non-Covid blue; available gray) graphs look like:
I had always assumed the drop around Christmas Day (214 on 12/25) was an artifact due to people not getting tested (test sites closed and/or results not being returned). Â (The other big drop about Jan. 3 was due to the state's data system being down for maintenance.)
I'm sure that was the cause of much of that drop. Â But maybe that artifact disguised a real drop at the same time with the renewed push to stop the spread at the time. Â I wondered why we didn't see really big numbers immediately after Christmas.
A typical timing is that symptoms (and new cases) appear a week after exposure, hospitalization happens a week to 10-days after symptoms appear, and the patient goes into the ICU a week to 10 days after that.
We are approximately 3 weeks after Christmas. Â I think the drops we are currently seeing in ICU cases are due to a drop that happened around Christmas. Â We will see them pick up again in a few days.
A possible slight drop in new cases in the last few days isn't yet visible in the new case graph. Â It seems to appear if you look at the announced new cases over the last week compared to the new cases the week before. Â 4 out of the last 5 days, the case numbers are down relative to the week before. The remaining day saw a rise of only 2 cases. Â The latest day's drop is the biggest of the drops.
I haven't looked at other counties or larger regions to see if this seems to be true in other parts of the SF Bay Area, or throughout California, or the US.