Rep. Bryan Terry has been giving updates on his Facebook page periodically on the status of COVID-19. The local doctor shares his insights.
Pic 1 Daily Brief: We have over 39,444 cases reported on the brief. Understand that those are positive cases and not just positive tests. Here are a couple of points to address. First, Dr. Redfield from the CDC has stated that between 5-8% of the population probably already has had coronavirus and testing has probably only picked up 10% of those who have been positive. So, likely there have been between 340,00 and 540,000 Tennesseans who have already had COVID-19. If you go by the 10% figure, then around 400K have probably had it. Secondly, Vanderbilt projected that if we removed COVID-19 restrictions that we would have about 13% of the population become infected or around 880,000 Tennesseans. If DR. Redfield is correct, and there is a lot of distrust of the CDC right now, it would mean that Tennessee is about halfway to Vanderbilts projection.
Pic 2 Daily Brief: Vanderbilt, also, projected that Tennessee hospitalizations would hover around 300. Obviously, we have outpaced that amount and are at 484. Here are a few points to ponder. First, the rate of rise in cases is far outpacing the rate of rise in hospitalizations which means that younger and healthier individuals are contracting COVID-19 at a higher rate. Additionally, my understanding is that Dr. Redfield projected that 25-35% of those that contract COVID-19 are asymptomatic. Lastly, total hospitalizations related to COVID-19 is around 4.9%. I’m told Shelby is around 9% and Davidson is around 6%. As you can see, though, we have over 20% of floor and ICU beds available. If the goal is to keep the curve flattened below available resources(which was the goal all along in case people have forgotten), then we are still below that threshold despite the rise in cases.
Pic 3 Age related cases: The picture is a spreadsheet of cases broken down by age group. With decisions about to be made by our school boards on returning to school, this information should be helpful. As a reminder, though, 25-35% are asymptomatic according to Dr. Redfield and testing has probably only caught 10%. If one recognizes that those over 60 account for most of the deaths, hospitalizations, and morbidity, then this spreadsheet is probably missing a significant number of cases for those under 60 simply because they were either asymptomatic or had symptoms so mild that they didn’t get tested.
Pic 4 Age related cases for Rutherford County: As noted above, the numbers are likely skewed due to asymptomatic individuals or those who haven’t been tested.
