I’ve been enjoying browsing Covid plots on ourworldindata.org.  It’s a really convenient interface that allows you to plot data from various countries simultaneously.  I wish you could plot by state, but sadly, that’s not possible.

First, CFR.  When our former president said, we have more Covid cases because we’ve been testing more, I was extremely skeptical.  But it turns out he may have been right.  We can see that the CFR for the US dropped below that of the EU on March 9, 2020.  (I would guess that CFR is a pretty good proxy for how much you’re testing.  An alternative guess is that we had just as much Covid as Europe, but we have better medical care in the US, or that our hospitals had greater capacity.  I think it’s more likely we did a better job testing.)  You can see, however, how badly the US bungled testing during the critical early days.  What a debacle.

Zooming in, you can see our CFR continues to be substantially lower than most countries in Europe.  The US is sitting at 1.8% and the EU at 2.3%; that’s more than 25% higher.  The UK is 60% higher at 2.9%.  Let’s hope that’s not because the UK variant is more dangerous.

Looking at a log view of the CFR over time, a few things jump out at me.  First, we know Israel and the UAE have done a bang up job testing their citizens.  The CFR in the UAE is only 0.33%.  That suggests they’re catching most cases.  (Last I read, the fatality rate for Covid is thought to be somewhere south of 0.5%, though it depends on the health of the population.)   But a number of things are odd.  Australia’s CFR is up with the UK.  Why?  With so few cases, one would think they would have an extremely low CFR – that they would catch all cases, and that the CFR would reflect the actual fatality rate of the disease.  Are 3% of people who infected with Covid dying in Australia??? Or are they missing two thirds or more of the cases?  Either one seems concerning and unlikely.  What is going on?  What’s up with Mexico?  Why were things so bad in the UK early on?  The fact that the CFR for the UK has been so consistently high for a very long time, relative to other countries, suggests that perhaps, and hopefully, the UK variant is not worse than other variants in terms of fatality, and they just do a really poor job testing.  But a great job vaccinating.  Give credit where credit is due.

Currently, the US is sandwiched between South Korea and Japan, which is a good place to be.  But it probably means something very different, given how much higher our caseload is.  Unfortunately, I am very familiar with the Covid testing process at this point, as we’ve had several Covid tests in the family, and will have more still, guaranteed.  For example, when my parents visit, we’ll have to do a Covid test before the kids can return to school – despite a 7-day quarantine after their arrival.  This kind of nonsensical over-testing of people who we don’t have any reason to believe they have Covid probably skews our CFR artificially downwards.  I mean, if you test people who are fully vaccinated just because they had the temerity to cross a state border, you’re going to get a negative that nicely decreases your CFR.

What do you think about the movement to “defund the police”?  Do you support it?

Interesting article today in the New York Times on how things are going in Minneapolis.

The sacred intersection where George Floyd died beneath the knee of a police officer has seen such an increase in violence that food delivery drivers are afraid to venture there. There have been gun battles, with bloodied shooting victims dragged to ambulances because of barricades keeping the police and emergency vehicles away.

But home in on the four neighborhoods surrounding George Floyd Square, the name given to the corner where Mr. Floyd died, and the story is far bleaker and deadlier. In those areas — Powderhorn Park, Central, Bryant and Bancroft — violent crime shot up by 66 percent last year, according to statistics from the Police Department. And this year, so far, little has changed.

The area has become something of an autonomous zone, with barriers and signs calling it “the free state of George Floyd.” The police have stayed away for almost a year to avoid inflaming tensions.

For what it’s worth, I oppose “defunding the police.”  Seattle came under federal Justice Department oversight under the Obama administration for excessive use of force, which disproportionately affects minority populations.  According to the (liberal paper) the Seattle Times, they were making great progress dealing more fairly with the population.  How was this accomplished?  Well, I’m sure it won’t surprise you that it required significant INCREASES to the police budget.  When the Seattle city council in its infinite wisdom cut the police budget, our African American female police chief, who was doing a good job in extremely difficult circumstances as far as I could tell, stepped down rather than fire the young minority officers she’d managed to hire during her tenure.  (The union won’t let you lay off who you want to – last in, first out, and obviously, the older officers are whiter.  Nothtatheresanythingwrongwiththat, but it seems intuitively obvious that having a diverse police force is a worthy goal.)

So what DO I think should be done?  Most of the problems, as far as I can tell, come down to the police unions.  It’s been really interesting to see the Democrats desert the police, since traditionally, they’ve been closely linked (like ALL organizations with a strong union are closely linked to the Dems.)  I think this is a very good thing.  While we’ve seen rising support for police among Republicans, Republicans are unlikely to support the union in the same way the Dems have.

Steps to take:

• Change state laws so that if a police officer in fact kills someone unjustly, they can be held accountable for their actions.
• Keep a NATIONAL registry of police officers let go with cause – Do.Not.Hire so that screwups from one force don’t just relocate to another.
• When an officer screws up and is let go, make sure the cause of termination is on his record.  Again, this comes back to weakening the union and in general, the ridiculousness of try to fire government employees.  An officer can do pretty much anything short of murder without getting a black mark on his record when he’s let go.  This is unacceptable.
• Hire more young, minority officers.

It really comes down, in my mind, to letting go the bag eggs.  They did an analysis, and something like 10% of SPD officers were responsible for the vast majority of violent encounters with civilians.  While some of that is no doubt reasonable (ie some officers probably work in more dangerous areas), it suggests that there are bad eggs.   It’s critical to figure out how to get rid of those guys and replace them with better officers.  A government job should not be a job for life if you suck.

Equally important, though, the long term solution is to get guns off the street.  We keep hearing about people killed by police because they are brandishing a ball point pen, or reaching in their pocket or something similar, when they were in fact unarmed.  I’m sure I’d be a terrible police officer, but no matter who you are, it’s a really hard job to be working with a criminal population armed to the teeth.  So the long-term solution?  Get rid of the guns.  I’m an extremist when it comes to gun control.  I’d like them gone.  I’d take us back to the 1700s if I could, Last of the Mohicans style.  Load one bullet at a time, baby, in a giant, impossible to conceal weapons.  Once the populace is disarmed, there’s no reason for 95% of police officers to carry a firearm or even mace or a taser.

When you have no-go zones, like CHAZ in Seattle or what’s apparently going on in Minneapolis, it’s the women and children who suffer.  Obviously women suffer when their husbands and sons are murdered by police, but they also suffer when criminals are allowed free reign.  It honestly reminds of Belfast, where the Catholic population (justly) distrusted the police and established massive no-go zones throughout the city.  These zones were controlled by the IRA, aka gangs.  You had all manner of idealist talk, but again, the women and children suffered living under unelected rule with mob justice.  Kids deserve a safe place to go to school and shop and so on, and that’s not what’s happening right now.