Happy Monday, Save Jerseyans, unless you’re a Media panic porn distributor. In that case, you might be on the brink of some exceptionally confusing times.
The folks over at Pantheon Macro, a “premier provider of unbiased, independent economic intelligence to financial market professionals,” dropped its new analysis early today showing that New Jersey and Michigan COVID-19 cases are trending up after dipping in February while most other U.S. states are witnessing a decline.
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The Media (including NBC’s Carl Quintanilla) is prepared to pounce:
"U.S. Cases Still Falling, but NJ and MI are Bucking the Trend" @IanShepherdson https://t.co/K8mdlSL134 #PantheonMacro pic.twitter.com/nAiQhcMD1F
— Pantheon Macro (@PantheonMacro) March 15, 2021
“.. the trend in cases in New Jersey is now clearly rising. Hospitalizations have flattened, and likely will start to rise by the end of this week. .. Michigan already has begun to trend upwards .. The B117 variant accounts for more than 40% of cases in the state.” @PantheonMacro pic.twitter.com/hKhdencmJX
— Carl Quintanilla (@carlquintanilla) March 15, 2021
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Sounds ominous, right?
Wrong.
Three things for you to chew on:
(1) “New” cases is a relative term in New Jersey. The state routinley harvests old cases and then dumps them, over time, and in so doing artificially inflates the present severity of the pandemic. On March 1st? 1 in 5 of the “new” reported COVID-19 cases were over a month old! For the month of March (as of this morning), New Jersey had added no less than 6,336 cases which were from February 15th or earlier. 3,822 date from 2020 (h/t Woke Zombie). So are cases truly “trending upward” in New Jersey? It depends in part upon what you count and how you count it.
(2) The original, laudable goal was “flattening the curve.” This week, Cape May will become the first New Jersey county to reach 25% of the adult population fully vaccinated. Between vaccinations and antibodies from prior Covid infection, there’s a building belief that we’ll have herd immunity this spring. Vaccines have thus far proven extremely effective at preventing severe illness and resulting hospitalizations. Less severe illness = less hospitalizations = little risk of overwhelming our healthcare infrastructure. Hence, why the Murphy Administration’s prediction of a mid-February hospital surge never materialized. Pantheon will likely turn out to be as wrong as Judy Persichilli.
(3) Why are Michigan and New Jersey spiking? MI and NJ had (and continue to have) some of the nation’s strictest lockdown measures. New Jersey, for example, is still only at 50% capacity (and only since this past weekend) for restaurants and retail while states like Florida, Connecticut and Maryland are all open for business. And guess what? FL, CT and MD all have a lower death rate and MI and NJ. So even if we accept this purported case surge as something genuine and worth worrying about… why are two states listening to Fauci experiencing upticks in cases? While ones who aren’t treating him like the second coming of Christ are doing just fine?
I wish the Media the best of luck making this latest data fit its narrative (that science-denying Republicans are putting everyone else in danger).
They’re going to need it; they might break their brains in the process!
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