NOTES

  In remembrance of five of the Americans who departed this week, spilling over half a million COVID deaths. Three men and two women; three African Americans; a rancher, a veteran from the war in Viêt Nam, an executive turned reverend, and a jazz pianist; an immigrant from Liberia; from Rhode Island to Utah; age range of thirty-seven to eighty-two; average age of sixty-three and median of seventy-two. B.L.U.F. (bottom-line, up-front) : penultimate data sweep. The last one will contain my thoughts on the eleven months I have been writing this blog. INTRODUCTION Another post-peak week. The momentum turned mid-week with a slight up-tick in new deaths. Two new variants discovered in New York City and Tunis, Tunisia (indicating a proliferation of variants permutating with mutations); each has created concern of anti-body evasion. First year fatalities look to be in line with the lower end of the revised projections from the University of Washington and the middle of the short-te...

In remembrance of five Americans taken away this week by the coronavirus. One immigrant; one decorated veteran from the war in Viêt Nam; one Ph.D. in science and a family farmer; three men, two women; ages raging from sixty-three to ninety-five; average age of seventy-seven and median of seventy-six. B.L.U.F. (bottom-line, up-front) : antepenultimate data sweep; tapering off this week and next with data-only for last installment as supplement to last letter of a series to friends and familiares on 05mar21. The data broke the right way. Now it is a matter of racing against the clock on vaccination. INTRODUCTION Great week, as hoped for, with deaths falling by more than a third week-over-week. Two obvious reasons explain these data: vaccines and the holiday surge finally working its way through the health-care system. It is important to note that the current weekly fatality level of 14,409 souls remains 35-50% above pre-Thanksgiving mortality tolls.  Though stalled this week by we...