Some new studies give some signs for hope that this pandemic may run out of steam sooner than we think. But first a couple of graphs.
Sweden vs USA, deaths per million (Sweden = Black USA = Red)
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Sweden vs USA cases per million
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Both deaths and cases per million look very similar when graphed. Sweden did not lock down economy, close schools, use masks while most of the USA did. Sweden did advise citizens to social distance, but nothing like the shelter at home guidelines issued in USA. Sweden's death rate per million is slightly higher than USA, but the graphs show a very similar rise to a peak and then fall. Cases per day rose quickly in both countries, then flatten and both showing a recent rise. But deaths are falling in both countries, not following the recent rise in cases. (The blip you see in Sweden recent deaths was caused by them adding some covid probable deaths in late June)
The reason deaths do not seem to be rising is probably the same for both countries, the new cases being found are mostly younger and asymptomatic, not tested before and in an age group that does not die from the virus frequently.
Anyway, the graphs and data show something is at work here and it doesn't have much to do with lockdowns etc.
Now lets look at Florida vs New York.
Florida vs New York daily deaths (NY = Red FL = Green)
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Boy we sure did flatten that curve huh? Good job Florida!
Florida vs New York daily new cases
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Wait a minute! Why are new cases in NY going down while ours are going up? NY opened up a month ago, they had huge Floyd protests there too. Maybe they are just better at reopening than we are, or maybe their protesters and a huge percentage of New Yorkers are immune.
Recently CDC Director Redfield said this: "Our best estimate right now is that for every case that's reported, there actually are 10 other infections," Dr. Robert Redfield, director of the CDC, said on a call with reporters Thursday.
OK, so NYC has had 212,000 confirmed cases times 10 = 2,120,000 actual cases if CDC correct. Population of NYC is 8 million or so, so that's about 25% of the population that are immune.
Several new studies have found another kind of immunity from the virus different from antibodies. New research from Karolinska Institutet and Karolinska University Hospital shows that many people with mild or asymptomatic COVID-19 demonstrate so-called T-cell-mediated immunity to the new coronavirus, even if they have not tested positively for antibodies. According to the researchers, this means that public immunity is probably higher than antibody tests suggest. Our results indicate that roughly twice as many people have developed T-cell immunity compared with those who we can detect antibodies in.”
So some people have such strong T cells that they fight off the virus without producing antibodies. Could be from exposure to other coronaviruses like the common cold. This study estimates there are twice as many T cell immune individuals as there are that have antibodies.
So now you can estimate that over 4 million New York City people would either have antibodies or T cell immunity. That's 50% of the population. Is that enough for herd immunity? It sure looks like it in their graph showing new case numbers dwindling down pretty rapidly.
A team at Stanford lead by Nobel Laureate Michael Levitt have been studying data from countries all over the world and think the virus begins to burn out and run out of hosts when infected individuals + asymptomatics reach a certain threshold. Levitt and colleagues think that the existence of large numbers of invisible cases of individuals who are asymptomatic and are not counted as confirmed cases may explain the non exponential behavior of the pandemic, the known cases can't find new people to infect because the invisible cases have already done so.
Basically, Levitt is saying that the various regions his team are tracking are reaching herd immunity faster and at lower levels than many epidemiologists think likely (60-70%)
"I personally think it's less than 30%" said Levitt.
A recent model by MIT predicts that absent a vaccine, the pandemic will grind on until next spring and that Global cases will rise to 249 million with deaths rising to 1.75 million in the 84 countries they survey.
I hope the Stanford guy is right.
New York City data looks like he may be.