The New York Times reports on Texas' and other states' struggles to deal with faxed COVID-19 test results from multiple small labs that aren't entirely set up for the 21st century. In Houston, the ICUs are half-full of COVID-19 patients, with the proportion still rising, and an excess of Hispanic and Black patients compared to the local population. (The article does not mention what has become of the usual ICU patient population that would be in those beds.) Under a misleading headline, the New York Times actually reports on the excess of pregnant Hispanic and Black women exposed to coronavirus and what this may say about the true coronavirus statistics by race.
Poynter documents the apparently permanent loss of local newspaper staffs to coronavirus closures. Also on the journalism front, Ars Technica of all places tears the New York Times a new one over their reporting of a non-existent change in the WHO's stance on airborne transmission last week:
In its updated scientific brief on transmission, the WHO said basically the same thing it has said for months on airborne transmission. That is: the question of whether SARS-CoV-2 lingers in the air is a topic of active discussion, and, while it may be possible in some settings, the data in aerosol transmission so far is inconclusive or unconvincing. But, as always, the WHO welcomes more high-quality research on this topic.Quillette reported a while back about misreporting of the WHO's stand on masks, and more generally on the poor outcomes to be had by telling people to wear masks "in public" rather than in specific high-risk situations.
P.S. Massachusetts cases are up a fifth of a percentage point today.
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