Day 44: Dubaious Death

The National reports that a 59-year-old Worcester man returning home to Logan from Chennai via Dubai died of cardiac arrest en route. The state police here are awaiting the autopsy and coronavirus test results—as are the 321 other passengers and 18 crew aboard the Boeing 777, especially the crew members who attempted CPR. The man had no pre-existing conditions but had been ill with gastrointestinal issues for an unspecified number of days before his flight. (Unlike "cold symptoms", gastrointestinal symptoms are an early sign of coronavirus infection.)

Here on the ground, the Commonwealth reported 164 cases total as of today, 108 traced to Biogen, 35 not yet traced to Biogen, 8 new travel-related cases, and no change in the Western Mass. cluster. PlagueBlog has heard that it's not clear to outsiders from the news that the Greater Boston area has pretty much shut down, with most school systems closed and many bars and restaurants now voluntarily closing. The mayor of Boston has also declared a health emergency, though it's not clear that means much at this point.

Rhode Island reached 20 cases yesterday, with no new cases today. Two recent cases are particularly notable, though: the Providence Journal reports that two children (age not specified) are among the cases. One had been on a cruise, and the other had gotten a signature from one of the two infected Utah Jazz players at their game in Boston on March 6th.

New Hampshire is up to 13 cases. The seventh case, a Rockland County woman, apparently worked at the Manchester DMV. If you visited the DMV in early March, you may want to read more about the case.

The New York Times reports that, due in part to union pressure, even the New York City school system will be closing starting Monday, until at least April 20th. The school system has 24 hours to figure out how to provide meals and childcare to some of the displaced students; remote education is to be planned out later this week. Public schools on Long Island and in Westchester County will also close.

NYC has now had five deaths, all involving pre-existing conditions, and the state has over 700 cases. The New York presidential primary may be delayed from late April until the date of a local election in late June. Louisiana and Georgia have also delayed their primaries.

Because, understandably, people just keep on drinking, the city of Hoboken (NJ) has closed all bars and restricted all restaurants to take-out only service, as well as implementing a 10pm curfew. The mayor excused all this in part with a confusing story about lack of EMS response to a bar fight on Saturday night.

Across the US there are 3,621 cases with 63 deaths, still mostly in Washington State and California. Italy is approaching 25,000 cases and Iran 14,000. Rumors about the UK "herd immunity" plan are greatly exaggerated. Hopefully the rumored vaccine from Israel (193 cases) is slightly less exaggerated. Austria, at 800 cases, has banned all gatherings of more than 5 persons.

P.S. The Governor of Massachusetts held a rare Sunday night presser to announce that our gatherings are now restricted to 25 people (down from 250), our restaurants are restricted to delivery and take-out only, and all schools, public and private, are closed for three weeks starting Tuesday. He closed some number of government offices, and the RMV (our DMV) is offering some extensions.

Visits to nursing homes are no longer allowed, hospital visitors must be screened, and non-essential procedures will be cancelled starting Wednesday. All commercial insurers are required to cover telehealth now, for free in the case of COVID-19, and some pharmacists will be allowed to make hand-sanitizer. (I suppose you used to have to be a compounding pharmacy to do so.)

The presser also claimed community spread in seven counties, even though we only have six counties with more than one case documented by the MDPH. It seems they've been peeking at the commercial lab results (seven of these have been positive already) and have decided some other cases won't be traced. Still, I think they may be exaggerating a bit to get people to hunker down before it's too Washington State.

He also mentioned the postponement of the Boston Marathon until September, news I'd missed earlier in the week. The Boston Globe article mentions that the MBTA will be running in full force Monday, but public transit service is likely to get reduced as soon as they come up with a plan to do so.