Coronavirus, the Late July Edition

 Coronavirus, the Late July Edition

       By the Numbers 

The over all numbers.  The number of new cases has risen dramatically.   From a low average of around 12,200 per day to over 67,000.  From an estimated 265,000 total cases (6/26) to over 720,000 (7/27). 

We should have anticipated this.  The average held steady all of June in the 12,200 new cases per day.  Since there was no further decline, then a new surge was a certainly.

And while nationally, this surge is upsetting, it is surging within the unvaccinated communities.  Not the vaccinated.  So within those communities, it is effectively double the impact.

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Lets go over a virus's Reproduction rating (hereafter referred to as the R rating).  The R rating is the number of people a virus will infect from a single infected person. The normal rating is referred to is the number in an unprotected population.  This number will change depending on the environment of the virus, like quarantine or vaccination percentage, environment, or natural herd immunity.

It is the R rating that got the medical systems of the world in an uproar about Covid last year. 

The Alpha variant had a rating of 4, so every infected person was going to infect 4 others. For the sake of comparison the regular flu is a 2, the Spanish flu of 1918 was a 1.8, and the C-19 Delta variant is a 5.

OK, blah, blah, blah, numbers, what does it mean?

Refer to the chart below

Virus  weeks later............
         0    1     2      3       4
Flu      1    2     4      8      16
Alpha    1    4    16     64     256
Delta    1    5    25    125     625

In an unrestricted environment, these are the number of infected people you will have starting at 1 person at the end of 4 weeks.  The difference between the flu's R rating of 2 and Alpha's R rating of 4 is 16 times.  This was THE main  reason for the economic shutdown last year.

This is the potential growth of the virus, until something changes.  With the flu it tends to end when the weather improves.  And is mitigated by the most vulnerable getting flu shots, about 160 million in the USA in 2018.  So the flu will not expand by it's natural rating of 2-1 but by closer to 1-1 in a normal season.

Now look at the difference between Alpha and Delta at 4 weeks.  This more than double the number of cases over 4 weeks.

And if you are one of those who think this is total bullshit, and there are a lot of you, remember, at one time there was just 1 person that had C-19 in the USA.  He arrived that arrived in Washington State on Jan 21, 2020 having traveled to a number of provinces including Wuhan.  I started logging the number of active cases on Feb 2, by then there were 13 known, with quite a bit more unknown cases in the USA.  Then the number of cases started tracking somewhere between the Alpha and Delta progression rates. 

Number of known infected starting at 

1/21/2020 and the weeks following:
           0    1     2      3       4
USA Corona 1    x    35     75     541

Of course the data is far from complete.  But the progression of known cases was still very dramatic. Note also, testing was done very poorly then, and these were just the cases we knew about.

Put this in perspective, In 2019 Influenza vaccinations, about 160 million, prevented an estimated 7.52 million illnesses, 3.69 million medical visits, 105,000 hospitalizations, and 6,300 deaths due to influenza.

Note 7.5 million illnesses and 6,300 deaths.  That's .084%.  C-19 is about .9% fatal and has about 2.7% long term disabling affects.  That's 10 times as deadly, and in the end of 4 weeks, 39 times more infectious than the flu.

During this 5th surge, Los Angeles hospitals are reporting 99% of the C-19 victims have not had the vaccine.  The Delta variant has found a home in the half of the population that refuse to get it. I have seen similar reports from Louisiana, Georgia and Pennsylvania. 

This is how it affects all of us.  

    1) It is causing an increased load on the medical system. 

    2) C-19 hospitalizations are being paid for by the federal government.  So each one of these refuse-nicks are now free loaders on the system.

    3) This also allows for more churn and opportunity for the next big variant. The current Greek letter designate is Lambda, aka "Peru".  At this time it is unknown if the variant Lambda is more infectious or more dangerous.

    4) The Delta variant kills you faster.  Where Alpha's often took 4-6 weeks to succumb, Delta takes 1-2 weeks.  So the refuse-niks won't be on the medical dole as long.

    5) If workers feel unsafe, they will not work.  Which is why there are shortages.  Dockworkers, truckers, ware houses, all are understaffed. 

So, for what ever reason the vaccine refuse-nicks claim, they certainly cannot claim patriotism, or compassion for their fellow man.  And if they do get the virus, it is pretty certain, they will be passing it on to their family and closest friends.

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Much political hay has been made over 5 members of the Texas Legislature's Democratic party catching Covid during their flight to Washington DC, but here are a few facts.

 

They were all vaccinated. The vaccination does not prevent you getting Covid, but does reduce the symptoms significantly. And the person is infectious for a shorter period of time.

 

Only 2 had any symptoms, and 3 were asymptomatic.

 

Per the CDC, out of 157 million people vaccinated by July 6, only 5,186 hospitalized or fatal breakthrough cases have been reported to the CDC, and more than 1,500 of those were asymptomatic.

 

So while this is unfortunate optics, it is not a reason to be a refusenick on the vaccine.

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The following is not based in fact, but derived anecdotal commentary from medical professionals.  The Delta variant may be deadlier, but there is a study or two that says it's not, But it does work faster.  Where Alpha cases often took 4-6 weeks to succumb, Delta takes 1-2 weeks.

Also there is much commentary about Delta patients are trending younger.  My opinion that is not because Delta is targeting the young.  My opinion is that the elderly have either been vaccinated (72-84%) or culled from the herd.  So if the 65 and older crowd is no longer available, so of course the currently infected are going to trend younger.

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Long term efficacy of the 2 shot vaccines, Moderna and GSK seems to be holding.  Of course we only have a couple of months data so far from the original test groups, and December/January early adopters.  But at 6 months, the vaccine seems to have only degraded about 3% from 95 in 6 months.  Giving hope that a booster would not be required against currently known variants.

The Chinese vaccine, has been reported to be totally ineffective after 6 months.  That does not effect the USA and Europe, but woe betide the rest of the world.

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The J&J single shot seems to be not as effective against the Delta variant.  One report I saw stated it was only 56% effective.  Just one so far.  From Jerusalem.  Normally I would give the Israeli's more credit, but  have seen some contrary information from them regarding the pandemic.

But do not panic over this.  Even at 56%, it still reduces symptoms substantially.  

But please, if you are concerned, or are showing any of the major symptoms (fever, shortness of breath, fatigue, body aches) mask up and see your doctor.  

Remember, I am just some guy on the internet.  I'm trying to do good, but I am not a medical professional.

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From an on line conversation.  "Variants are never as deadly as the original."

"Have you heard of the Spanish flu?"

 

 

Civilian Space Programs

 Civilian Space Programs

By the Numbers

Beck, Bezos, Branson and Musk (in alphabetical order).  These men have created amazing technological machines for advancing mankind into space.  

There have been much criticism of the narcissistic nature of their endeavors, or complaints about how the money could have been better spent on <place your favorite charity here>, but lets give these men their due.  They had the focus and drive spanning decades to make these achievements.  Something you or I couldn't do if we had a hundred years.

And you know it.  It may take a maniacal narcissist to make these accomplishments.  Could you say the same thing about Ford, Edison, or Siemens?  

Lets look at the effort.

Beck (again in alphabetical order) is the CEO of Rocket Lab.  You probably haven't heard of him or his company. They are based in New Zealand.  Rocket Labs goal is to create rockets that are not  manufactured, but printed.  Everything except the electronics.  Which is Commercial of the Self (COTS). Founded in 2006, their first launch was in 2017.  They have had 17 launches with only 3 failures, and a price tag of around 100 million.  Their total expenditures so far seems to be about 250 million.  As such, they are the cheapest way right now to put hardware into space.   They are currently capitalized at around 4 billion, and are looking to build new facilities in the USA.  

Rocket Lab's 3D printed "Electron" Rocket

Rocket Lab may be the dark horse in this race.  The reuse of their boosters is still unproven, but planned, but the production costs are also very low, and they are already doing practical work.

Bezos launched Blue Origin in the year 2000.  Other than it's existence and intention, not much was known about it until 2015.  That is a long time to invest outside the limelight.  How much money was spent is uncertain as well.  Bezos said he was "investing" a billion dollars a year into the company.  Lets take him at his word and he was spending that from 2015 onward.  I am sure it was quite a bit less in the earlier days.  But if you calculate using some descending sliding from 2015 to 2000, I can see 11 billion dollars having been spent.  

The "New Shepard" reusable rocket.  And yes, Jeff Bezos is compensating for something.

Probably a few billion less, Bezos didn't have all that much money in the early 2000's :) *  But he probably could have scrapped together 10-20 million to start this pie in the sky dream.

And he stuck with it.  I am sure he thought he would be riding into space in 5 years.  Any reasonable person would think that.  And it didn't happen, but year after year, the he continued to invest into this project.  So 2 decades and 11 billion dollars later, he finally rode his rocket, "New Shepard",  into space.  

Branson registered Virgin Galactic in 1999, but didn't launch the company until 2004.  At that point he had been managing companies for over 20 years.  So his efforts were more orientated by the realities of accounting, then dreams of the technology.  As such, he picked a design that looked most economical.  And possibly influenced by the TV show, "UFO", which had a similar system for putting space shuttles into orbit.  Drop a rocket from a mother ship.  The US air-force had done the same thing in the 50's with their X-15's being dropped by B-52s.  He probably also expected to fly into space in about 5 years.  

IMHO, the most elegant solution flying.  Branson's SpaceShipTwo being carried aloft by WhiteKnightTwo

And, like Bezos, found out first hand that the term "rocket scientist" was not just a word.   Years went by, but he had the drive and determination to see it through.  17 years and by my estimate**, 2 billion dollars later, he rode SpaceShipTwo into sub orbit.

Musk founded SpaceEx in 2001.  But his goal was to expand the practical nature of space travel.  I know from personal experience that they had a system for monitoring trash trucks from space.  Using satellite up-links to determine optimal routes and assessing when the truck needed to be emptied.

The company only had 170 employees in 2004, but this was before they started producing their own rockets.  Musks determination was to drive the cost of access to space down through reusable boosters and Commercial Off The Shelf (COTS) products.

The company expanded to 3,500 by 2010, and peaked around 9,700 in 2019.  Estimated costs for all of SpaceX so far is around 6 billion dollars.

SpaceX's Starship launches into the sky.  The picture does not provide the proper scale at 160 feet tall, and can carry over 100 tons of cargo.

So what do we have?  Rocket Lab's printable rockets ("Electron") have proven themselves for light loads, in low orbits, at the lowest cost. They recovered their last booster, and plan on establishing reusability.  Driving their costs lower still.  A larger, 3D printed rocket ("Neutron") is currently being designed.

Bezo's rocket seems to be just a single purpose, a joyride for the rich.  We know that reusable rockets can be up-scaled, as Musk's "Spaceship" has demonstrated.  But will Bezos's ego and deep pockets allow that?  Blue Origin is working on a new reusable rocket, named "New Glenn", to take satellites into orbit.   So the tech demonstrated by Blue Origin is being carried forward to do useful work.  Also the fuel being burned is environmentally clean, as the only fuel is hydrogen, and the exhaust is water.****

Branson's design has so much potential.  But the system seems to be self limiting.  The maximum size of his rocket is determined by the size of the mothership aircraft, "White Knight Two".  Both will have to be up sized to do practical work.  And aircraft do not up size so easily.  Doubling the wing span would involve increasing the weight squared.  And White Knight Two is already at the limits of it's state of the art materials.  As joyrides go, The Virgin Galactic craft doesn't get as high, or experience zero gee as long as Bezos.  But I suspect it's refurbishing cost is lower, because the rocket is overall smaller, and Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo carries 8 passengers, vice Blue Origin's  4.

But Branson didn't spend nearly the amount of money Bezos did, and won their private space race.

It looks like Musk's SpaceX is going to be the dominant civilian space company.  Rather than shooting for the panache goal of space tourism, he was working on infrastructure from practical engineering point of view.  He already has reusable boosters, put satellites into orbit and has sent both automated supply ships and then astronauts to the International Space Station.  His "Starship", can put over a 100 tons into orbit.   Literally, you could put both Bezos and  Branson's rockets inside of Starship, and still pack a dozen Tesla's for the ride.

And Musk has already shot a Tesla automobile towards Mars***.  

How do we evaluate these men?  They have their flaws but have accomplished great things.  

        Ego         Risk     Charisma       Humor

Beck     1           1           1            4

Bezos    2           2           2            1

Branson  4           3           4            2

Musk     3           4           3            3

Evaluated as rating between themselves.   

All of them have drive and ambition beyond normal men.  All of them have put at least 15 years into these rockets.  All are willing to accept great risks.

For ego, I am giving Branson the highest rating.  For over 20 years before Virgin Galactic, he had run numerous companies, and was a noted dare devil.   Flying around the world in a balloon was one of his feats.  Musk over Bezos because Musk has been setting up a number of futuristic projects for his brand.  Beck at the bottom, because he does not seem to have the desire to be famous.

For risk.  All these men are risk takers.  They have all invested many years and treasure into these projects.  Far beyond what Wall Street investors are willing to take.  Two of them put their lives on the line flying in their machines.  But I put Musk first.  You only have to look at this montage of crashes SpaceX experienced to know that his mantra is "Failure is not an option, it is a requirement".  Also, of these four, his businesses are the most kept afloat by the faith of his investors that he will succeed.  If he fails somewhere, that faith would collapse all his enterprises.  Economically, he has put the most at risk.

Because of his daredevil nature, I am giving Branson second place.  But if Virgin Galactic fails, it would not affect his other businesses.  I am putting Bezos next, after all, he took his brother on the first manned flight of his rocket.  It could have been a very bad day for Mama Bezos.  But personal risk aside, Bezos has nothing really at stake here.  If he doubled his investment, and doubled again, and lost it all, it would just be a footnote on his tax forms.

Beck also has his company on the line, but Rocket Lab is already a successful business.  Even if it should fail, he has clearly shown himself to be an extremely competent CEO, with long range vision.

For charisma.  Defiantly Branson, he was the face of daring business enterprises for decades before this.  Musk an obvious next.  No one has accused Bezos of excessive charisma, but I'll give him the 3rd place due to the relative anonymity of Beck.

For humor.  Hands down Beck.   Just look at Rocket Lab's mission names.  From "It's a test", "Look Ma, No Hands", "They go up so Fast",  and the last one, number 17, "Running Out of Toes".  Musk is next, he did a cameo on Big Bang Theory, probably signed off on the crash montage mentioned before, and as a test weight for his rockets, launched one of his Tesla cars towards Mars, while playing "Major Tom" to the space suited crash dummy.  

Ground control to Major Tom.

 

*He was  worth only around 1.5 billion in 2001, most of it tied up in Amazon stock.

**AKA a broad ass guess based on 873 current employees

*** Yes, I know, he missed that target. 

**** I know, most hydrogen is derived from cracking natural gas, so that part is not clean, but as solar/wind/fusion comes on line, electrolysis will be the method to break apart water and then it will be clean.

Coronavirus, the Mid July Edition

 Coronavirus, the Mid July Edition

       By the Numbers 

There is only one piece of news worth noting.  The Delta Variant of Covid has taken root in the largely unvaccinated portions of the country.

The rapid retreat of Covid due to vaccinations and social distancing was nothing short of a miracle of medical science.  From a peak of over 301,000 new cases a day on Jan 8, to an average of 12,200 per day for all of June.  And with that drop, states have been rescinding all the rules.  In Pennsylvania there was the caveat you can go mask-less if you are vaccinated.  But everyone was going mask-less, vaccinated or not.  

The unvaccinated are relying on the the vaccinated to keep them safe.  They are wrong to do so.  On July 16th, the new case count was 36,700, tripling last weeks daily count and accelerating.  In PA, the average was down to 140 per day, was now over 500 on Thursday.  In the same time period, Texas was 1,200 per day, and was 3,600. 

About 49% of the population is fully vaccinated, and some percentage partially so.  Not enough to put the brakes on Covid.  States are closing down their vaccination sites due to a lack of interest.  From a couple of million doses a day to 400,000 or so nation wide.  

Back in May, I reported what happened in the Seychelles Islands.  This is as close to a controlled experiment as you can get with humans.  Totally isolated, with a population of 98,000, 62% vaccinated.  They removed restrictions and within 6 days had a 1,068 new cases among the unvaccinated.  In the USA, this would be like 320,000.  

And now the USA has replicated the Seychelles Experiment.  Science! 

The Reproductive number, which is the evaluation of how many people an infected person will infect normally, for flu is 2, for Covid Alpha, it was 4, for Delta it is a 5.  Delta became the dominant variant in the USA this month.  

Delta is more infectious, and by some accounts more lethal.  I have seen headlines of people dying faster.  But I have also seen evaluations that it is not more lethal.  So the jury is still out. 

But if you have been vaccinated, your concerns are minimal.  It works just fine against Delta. In May only 150, or .8%, of the Covid deaths were among the vaccinated.  Not hitting the top 12 causes of death.  For the unvaccinated, 18,000 deaths, which puts Covid at #3 over accidents, (13,400 per month in 2017).

If you account for the concentration effect, that those deaths are going to occur in a sub set of the population, would be 36,000 equivalency for the month, which does not reach #2 spot of Cancer at 50,000 per month.  

I am just trying to put the numbers in perspective. 

If you are vaccinated, don't worry about it.  Enjoy life.

If not, WTF is wrong with you?

Covid deaths are now preventable.

A cartoon from the 30's.  History repeats.

UFO's Are Not Flying Saucers Part 2

UFO's Are Not Flying Saucers
Part Two
By the Numbers

Part one can be found -->> here.

I came across an article that explains so much about why there is an uptick in reporting of UFO's recently.  It is on the website Skeptoid, https://skeptoid.com/episodes/4787 and it's being driven by just a few people with vested interests.

This handful of people has an agenda to promote their belief that both flying saucers and poltergeists are extra-dimensional beings, and not aliens from another world in our galaxy, but breaking though the dimensional walls that separate the multiverse.  This group has been at it for 50 years.  Then tend not to mention the poltergeists because even they know that sounds loco.  So they are just trying to get the general populous to accept flying saucers first.

And to a large extent, they have been successful.  

Flying Saucers  33% believe, 7% unsure.
Poltergeists       45%
Vampires           11%

Lets just accept that 10% of the population are going to believe anything.  So getting 33% of the general populous to believe is quite a feat.  But that number had been waning, for quite a while, because of decades of no proof.  Still, it is quite an accomplishment.  Though it looks like they would do better if they went with poltergeists instead.  Of course there is even less evidence for poltergeists than flying saucers, and there is zero chance the US government would fund poltergeist research, and so now we have our motivation.

The current kerfuffle on UFO's started in 2017 with a New York Times article.  It talked about the Navy videos mentioned and the pilots radio chatter.  The Navy has not and will not comment on these videos.

The article was written by Leslie Kean.  Who has several books written on the UFO's, and so has a vested interest.

The article was backed by Hal Puthof and Chris Mellon.  They were on the CIA's "Stargate" Project, testing psychic's ESP powers in the 70's.  The project was canceled due to a lack of evidence and it sounded like a foolish waste of money when trying to explain it to Congress.

After the project was canceled, they left the CIA, and found a home in Skinwalker ranch, owned by Robert Bigelow, a hotel magnate and afterlife enthusiast.  They formed a company called the National Institute for Discovery Science, and talked Harry Reid, US Senator, Nevada, into funding their Institute with 22 million dollars for a project called Advanced Aerial Threat Identification Program.  Another vested interest.  The project had one employee, Luis Elizondo, and ran for 5 years.  After that they hired Leslie Kean to write the article for the New York Times in 2017.

Capitalizing on the increased interest in UFO's, this group floated 50 million dollars in stock on their next venture, "To the Stars Academy", and entertainment company, which funded the series, Unidentified: Inside America's UFO Investigation for HISTORY channel.  

Luis Elizondo is currently forming a company called SkyFort, with the intention of interpreting UFO videos for the US Government.

So there you have it.  Not only are there no flying saucers, the main promoters keeping the idea alive have strong vested interests in keeping it so.

5,000 Dead Voted in Fulton County

The 2020 Election Lies You May Have Heard

 5,000 Dead Voted in Fulton County

I recently had someone claim that 100,000 dead people voted in Fulton county.  A quick Google search revealed that he felt the need to inflate the original lie by 20 fold.

Trump actually said, “The other thing, dead people. So dead people voted. And I think the number is in the — close to 5,000 people. And they went to obituaries. They went to all sorts of methods to come up with an accurate number. And a minimum is close to about 5,000 voters.”

So not 100,000.  

This claim was totally refuted by Brad Raffensperger, a Republican, and secretary of state for Georgia.  He said “The actual number were two. Two. Two people that were dead that voted. And so that’s wrong.”

Why Don't They Spend the Money Here, on Earth?

 Why Don't They Spend the Money Here, on Earth?

  By the Numbers

I had a meme cross my desk that represented an all too common theme.  "If you are rich enough to feed everyone, why would you choose to go into space?"  

Probably a reference to which of the billionaires, Bezos or Branson will make it into space first on their purpose made ships, launched by their companies Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic.

Before I get into it, the answer is EGO.  Pure and simple.  And I am ok with that.

Its a common complaint.  One at least as old as I am.  I first heard a variation of it in Junior High School.  Substitute H-Bomb and India, but the thought is the same.  My teacher explained that you just don't build a bomb, it requires scientists, engineers, administration, supplies, truckers, managerial skills and janitors.  What India was building was not an atom bomb, but a nucleus (pun intended) of the technological society that we see today.  And looking ahead 50 years from then, can anyone say that they made the wrong choice? 

True, India has a very large number of poor people, but the last famine was many decades ago, and I would defy the USA to resolve a 1.2 billion people problem any better.

The complaint about the space program shooting those dollars into space instead of <insert your favorite charity here> is just a whine about how "they" would spend the money, and then all the world would be wonderful.

But first.  A clarification, no one has shot any money into space.  Satellites,  space stations, probes, and in one stunt, an upper mid range automobile.

But not money.

It stayed right here.

The Space Plane, "White Knight 2" carrying "Space Ship 2" 

When Elon Musk started SpaceX, he hired over 3,000 scientists, engineers, administrators, managerial types and janitors. He built facilities, which hired construction workers, designers, and truckers and built supporting infrastructure.  

Where did the money come from?

He borrowed it from rich people.  You can call them investors, or banks.  But in the end, Musk redistributed the wealth from rich people, and gave it to  scientists, engineers, administrators, managerial types, truckers and janitors.  

And they used that money to buy houses, cars and food.

And the stores they frequented owners used it to pay their bills, and run their businesses.  A basic economic rule of thumb is the benefit to the economy is about 7-1 as the dollars cycle.

So if Besos, Branson and Musk had not created their space companies, 7,000ish highly paid and highly trained people would be doing what?  What would that money be doing?

The trained people would be applying for positions of a slightly smaller pool requiring their talents.  This lowers their value. 

The money, like as not, would be sitting in a bank vault, not helping anyone.

But none of it would be shot into space.

Addendum.

To address further the complaints.  Bezos has given away 10 billion to charities.  That is 5% of his total wealth.

Branson has given away 2 billion to charities, about 50% of his wealth.

Musk, by comparison, is miserly, at 150 million to charity.  On the other hand, Musk's economic position is no where near as secure as Bezos and Branson.  I don't think any of his business ventures have turned a profit yet, so he is running on good will of his investors.

Coronavirus, the Early July Edition

Coronavirus, the Early July Edition

       By the Numbers 

Some weeks I scramble for numbers, and some weeks they are thrown at me.  It has been reported that in May, the “breakthrough” infections in fully vaccinated people accounted for fewer than 1,200 of more than 853,000 COVID-19 hospitalizations. That’s about 0.15%.

And only about 150 of the more than 18,000 COVID-19 deaths in May were in fully vaccinated people. That translates to about 0.8%.

Which means that 99.2% of the Americans currently dying of the coronavirus are unvaccinated.

As of 7/2, 54% of all Americans have received at least one dose, and 47% are fully vaccinated.

For the last two weeks, the average number of daily new cases has stabilized at 12,500.  12,312 were unvaccinated.  

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As we step off our moral-high-ground ;) lets remember the yearly crud.  As we mix it up again, all the sniffles, colds, fevers that comprise the fall cold season are going to hit us hard.  Our immune systems have had a 16 month hiatus, and may be a bit slow starting up again.  Those little germ spreaders are going to be going to school in the fall, and the churn will begin.

1. Practice proper hand washing. ...Yeah, that's going to be with us for a while :)
   
2. Stock your medicine cabinet. Nyquil works well for me.
3. Load up on other health supplies. ...
4. Fill your pantry with drinks and comfort foods. ...I can deal with a case of Mac and Cheese
5. Get a flu vaccine. ... 
6. Take those sick days when needed. 
   

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On June 27th, Pennsylvania's official count of new cases was 97.  This is the first time I have tracked a double digit number for the state.  This is less than 1% of the peak number of 12,089 on Dec 4th.  That number was for Sunday, which is normally a low number, but still it feels good to see the virus in rapid decline. 

As of 6/28 all quarantine restrictions have been lifted in the state.  So if you are vaccinated, go out and enjoy life.

As of 6/29, 8 million or 62%, of Pennsylvania is partially or fully vaccinated.  The average number of new cases has been declining for months, and is currently at 179 per day.  This also has been stable for about 2 weeks.

As of 6/29, 14.6 million or 48% of Texas is partially or fully vaccinated.  Texas's population 2.5 is times greater than PA, and lifted quarantine restrictions in March, has an average daily count of  new cases stabilized at 1,200 for the last 5 weeks.

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Someone asked if I could do a number of infections by square mile.  I think he took umbridge with me declaring Missouri being the current most infected state in the union by population:

District Of Columbia     3.26  (infections per sq mile)
Connecticut     0.57
Louisiana     0.40
New Jersey     0.38
California     0.21
New York     0.19
Delaware     0.16
Mississippi     0.14
Missouri     0.14
South Carolina     0.13
Pennsylvania     0.12
North Carolina     0.12
Arkansas     0.12
Rhode Island     0.12
Washington     0.10
Illinois     0.10
Massachusetts     0.09
Indiana     0.08
Arizona     0.08
Texas     0.08

Since then, Missouri has declined, from .30% to .15%, AND a number of states have increased in the number of active cases.  Wyoming (vaccination rate 39%) and Louisiana (vaccination rate 37%) now are at .57% and .45% per sq mile respectively.

And while that is not a good thing, All states have pulled back dramatically from the peak days of January.  Wyoming by 80% and Louisiana by some 90%. 
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On Myocarditis

The vaccines produced by Pfizer and Moderna have been linked to cases of Myocarditis in young adults.  The numbers are 12 in 1,000,000, with 9 out of 10 being considered mild and treatable.