When it comes to Texas’ coronavirus surge, be vigilant and cautious, but not fearful
Commentary Magazine senior editor Abe Greenwald lamented on a recent podcast that the one thing we can be sure of “when it comes to Covid [is] there really are no experts.”
That is perhaps the most succinct distillation of the frustration at the heart of our current public health crisis.
Even the “science” and the “data” that inform policy decisions and dominate news cycles are often contradictory, incomplete and therefore, hardly definitive.
Thst makes them easy to misinterpret and, when necessary, to exploit to fit whatever narrative serves the storyteller best.
This is true whether the storyteller is a fear-monger or a skeptic.
I’m not here to be either of those.
But as I peruse the headlines on the pandemic in the U.S. and even in Texas, I feel like the narrative has been for months and continues to be solely one of fear.
I get it.
People are more likely to follow the rules — social distance, wear their masks, refrain from large group gatherings — if they are afraid of the consequences of violating them: getting sick or making someone else sick.
And I won’t be flip about it, either. We have real reason for concern.
Cases are dramatically rising in nearly 40 states.
In Texas, the statewide seven-day average positivity rate is 15 percent, alarming when considering that the state has exceeded its goal of conducting 30,000 viral tests a day for some time now.
And in some of the state’s hot spots, such as Houston, the threat of the virus overwhelming the city’s medical infrastructure does not appear wholly unfounded.
That threat doesn’t appear imminent for Tarrant County, where as of Wednesday, only 10% of hospital beds were being used for COVID-19 patients.
Count me among those who would prefer we not test our county hospitals’ surge capacity. Still, I see lots of reasons not to fear.
For example, new cases in Tarrant are the most prominent among younger people with nearly 40 percent of them presenting in the 25-44 age cohort — a trend across several states.
In Tarrant, that age group accounts for only 5 percent of deaths. Not to be glib about it, but young people are faring the best with the virus and, particularly when they are healthy, are more likely to have mild cases and fully recover.
In a world where all the news seems bad, this should be viewed as a good thing.
And while hospitalizations are on the rise, patients in that age group are less likely to have the lengthy stays that older, sicker patients endure.
And after they recover, they should help build herd immunity.
Speaking of that, there are several new studies that suggest “some people have underlying T-cell immunity from past coronaviruses that can help them vanquish the novel virus without developing antibodies” and can still ward-off future infection — good news for those who contend an effective vaccine is still years away at best and for those whose antibody test turned up negative.
Then there is the confounding fact that while new cases have been surging across the U.S., deaths have not. This is often conspicuously absent from the reporting on the second wave of infections.
Since deaths are a lagging indicator, a surge is still possible.
But given the demographics of new cases and developments in treatment and care, it’s also possible that the fatality rate will remain steady and perhaps even continue to decline. That’s huge.
To be clear, the pandemic is real and it’s serious.
Yes, we should continue to be cautious, vigilant and respectful of the vulnerable around us.
But we should also remember that science and data are best when viewed and reported on holistically. When they are, there are lots of reasons to not dwell on the fear.
